Furious Caley Thistle head coach Billy Dodds slammed Morton for the standard of their facilities – even ahead of their Scottish Cup shoot-out loss to Morton.
After watching his Championship leaders crash out of the Scottish Cup on penalties to their Championship hosts, boss Dodds felt he needed to highlight the off-field conditions his players faced.
He said: “I spoke to Andy Millen (Morton assistant boss) and one of the Morton directors that we have made a 400 mile round trip and we are in two portacabins.
“One upstairs has no lighting which is a health hazard and I couldn’t put the players up there as you can’t see the stairs.
“The toilets are a disgrace, the generator went off at half-time and I have had my team talk in darkness.
“I wouldn’t put vermin in there, it was that bad.
“It’s not sour grapes, but Scottish football should be better than this, it’s a shambles.
“It’s not acceptable and my boys are sitting there freezing.
“For health and safety it is a disgrace. It’s not so bad in the summer but on a winter’s night it is a disgrace to be treated like that.
“I have never in 36 years seen anything like that.
“The Morton staff are good people and they apologised but it is disgraceful and disgusting.
“I don’t think any team should be treated like that.”
Dodds was also bitterly disappointed with his team after a second cup exit in seven days. Last week, a much-changed side lost on penalties to Raith Rovers in the SPFL Trust Trophy.
Dodds is demanding an improvement when they return to knock-out contests next year.
He said: “I am frustrated. In cup competitions this year, we think we can just manoeuvre our way through games and hopefully sneak it. I want that mentality to change.
“In the first half, we did just enough and ‘let’s see if we can get a goal in the second half’. I don’t want that mentality. I want goals and to take the pressurised situations off ourselves.
“We got to the penalties and we thought ‘here we go again’. I want to change the culture at this club and the mentality. I am not having a go at the players, but there were times where we just gave it half-pace. ‘We will maybe just sneak through the tie’. I don’t want that mentality.”
Motherwell will host Morton in the fourth-round on January 22.
Dodds takes his team back down to Inverclyde this Saturday when these sides battle it out again for league points at Cappielow.
ICT will be looking for the win to keep them in pole position, while the Ton are after the win which might pull them away a little from the danger zone.
