James McPake was left furious that his Dundee players let Ross County out of jail in a 3-2 defeat in Dingwall.
Twice Dundee took the lead against the Staggies through Luke McCowan, and twice they were pegged back before Regan Charles-Cook’s winner for the home side.
As far as the Dee boss was concerned, though, his side should have been out of sight in a first half where they moved the ball with intensity inside the opposition half.
Instead, he was left bemoaning poor decision-making as he returned to the city of discovery with no points.
“The game should have been dead and buried, we had a chance to make it 3-1 and 3-2 later,” McPake insisted.
“We don’t punish them but we should still be able to defend better regardless.
“We got ourselves in a really good position in the game. The first was a decent goal from Luke, the second an excellent goal, with Max Anderson excellent. I’m gutted he’s on the losing side after that. He didn’t deserve that.
“We had experienced players who made very bad decisions. When you do that in this league, it costs you.
“Malky Mackay said to me his side got out of jail but I disagree – it was all our own doing with not being able to defend our box.
“Key decisions in the game and three crosses do us. Three poor, poor goals. You see our goals and how hard we have to work for them but we gifted them their three goals.”
Ross County manager Malky Mackay, meanwhile, was unsurprisingly pleased to record a second win of the campaign over Dundee – and one that took the Staggies off the foot of the Premiership table.
“The lay-person watching that today got a hell of a game for their money,” Mackay said.
“I knew it would be tough just looking at Dundee’s vein of form since we played them. I knew they’d be dangerous.
“In the first half we were wasteful with the ball, and that saw us 2–1 behind at the break.
“The challenge, then, was to make sure we won our first and second balls.
“There are ways to win games. Last time we passed Dundee off the park.
“This was a day where we ground the game out and had a will to win. That showed in the second half.”
