Iain Vigurs feels he and his fellow midfielders must carry the burden for supplying Ross County’s attackers with goalscoring ammunition.
The Staggies are boosted by the return of Ross Stewart for tonight’s Premiership trip to Motherwell, following two months out with a hamstring injury.
Fellow striker Billy Mckay has risen to the task during Stewart’s absence, with a run of five goals in his last four matches seeing him join the 23-year-old on the 11-goal mark for the campaign.
Vigurs feels he has an important role to play in ensuring Stewart and Mckay, along with fellow forwards Lee Erwin and Oli Shaw, can maintain peak form in the final 10 games of the season.
Vigurs said: “We need to be at it for the strikers to be at it. Billy is a predator in the box. When you get him in between the goals, more likely he’s going to score a goal.
“It’s good at the business end of the season for him to be firing on all cylinders, which is ideal for us.
“You always want your best players on the pitch, and for Ross to be back at this point in the season is perfect for the team.
“We need to give these strikers a chance to do their jobs.
“That lies with the midfield, so we need to be on point to give them chances to score goals.”
Vigurs will return to a former haunt when the Staggies make the trip to Fir Park, with the Aberdeen-born player having an injury-hit two-year spell with the Lanarkshire outfit.
The 31-year-old is wary of the Steelmen, who are without a win in eight games but remain third in the table.
He added: “I haven’t been back to Motherwell in a while. It’s good to go back and get booed by another set of fans. It’s just a different type of boo, it’s got a bit of an accent on it.
“They have always got a good pitch, so I always like going back there – hopefully we can get a good result.
“They are going through a rough patch, but they have got match-winners and a good side. We can’t take anything for granted.
“As with every team that’s going through a bad spell, it’s going to change at some point.
“We don’t want to be that team.”
Staggies co-manager Steven Ferguson is pleased to have Stewart back in contention following his injury lay-off, and he added: “It has been a good week for Ross and I’m delighted to say he’s back in the group. He’s trained really hard. He’s a big player for us and he’s definitely in our thoughts.”