INJURED Morton defender Lewis Strapp has revealed his anguish at not being able to help his team-mates out at the crunch point of the season.

The 24-year-old has been ruled out of action since being crocked against Dunfermline last month, with his presence badly missed.

With Ton caught in a form slump and their promotion play-off hopes ended, the sidelined left back can only look on and hope for a change in fortunes during the last three games of the season.

The Ton head to Arbroath this weekend looking to win and all but ensure Championship safety after only taking one point out of the last nine available. And Strapp believes the first goal could be crucial in the match at Gayfield.

He told the Tele: "Every game since the Dunfermline game has been tough to watch as obviously I want to be playing.

"It's a crunch time of the season, the business end of the year where you're picking up points to see where you'll finish up.

"You want that to be as positive an end as possible, but we've hit a wee rough patch unfortunately.

"We've seen time and time again though that we can come back from these types of situations as a group.

"I have got full confidence that the boys can go and do it again this weekend against Arbroath.

"This weekend will be no different, we go into every game looking to get three points.

"We hit that run of games where things fell into place for us whereas now things are now going the other way which has been frustrating.

"We're getting chances to go a goal up and we aren't taking it, before getting hit with that sucker punch at the other end.

"When you go 1-0 up in this league it's quite rare that you lose the game.

"We need to try and get that bit of luck and get the first goal this weekend."

Strapp says that his previous near year-long injury lay off has changed his approach to looking after himself and he has been more patient this time round.

He said: "Before my last injury I'd have ran myself into the ground, I wouldn't have stopped playing even if I had felt some pain in my knee.

"But now it's a case of missing a handful of games to make sure I don't miss out on the start of pre-season and next season.

"That's a big deal for me because I don't want to go into pre-season with any unnecessary niggles. I want to keep my momentum going after coming back and proving my fitness.

"It's difficult to come to a conclusion like that. But once you've had an injury as bad as the one I had was, it makes you grow up and take a step back to look at things with a different perspective."