LIVINGSTON boss David Martindale was left frustrated at his team's 'schoolboy defending' after losing to Ross County at the Tony Macaroni Arena.
The 48-year-old's side fell to their second successive Scottish Premiership defeat following on from the loss to St Mirren in their last league outing.
“We lost the game due to a bit of schoolboy defending. The first contact is poor, then we do not make the second contact," the Lions manager said
“You do not win games of football if you do not defend your box properly.
“We seemed to look more focused on taking the ball forward rather than our own defensive work.
“We dominated large spells of the game with corners and shots, but we were poor at the back.
“It is not good enough from us."
Martindale also spoke about how better a position his team would be in if they had turned recent defeats into wins
He continued: “However you want to sugar-coat it, we have thrown away more points today.
“We threw away points against St Mirren last week. During the Motherwell game, we got points taken from us.
“Overall, we should have at least three extra points."
The match started off relatively even, with both teams enjoying spells with the ball.
It was just under 15 minutes in when the first real opportunity came after Kurtis Guthrie capitalised on a mistake by the Staggies and was able to drive into the box to fire in a cross.
However, there was no one there to make contact.
Moments later, the Englishman should have put the home team in front thanks to a clever pass from Cristian Montano, but he fluffed his lines from just a few yards out.
The Highland side created little in the first half in terms of chances and action from both teams until the interval remained sparse as they went in level at the break.
At the start of the second half, the away team made a change when the previously mentioned Watson was replaced by Callum Johnson.
55 minutes in saw the best opportunity of the game so far as a well-worked free-kick by Sean Kelly found Nouble in the box, who teed up Scott Pittman for a strike just inside the box.
The attempt was saved superbly by County goalkeeper Ross Laidlaw, who got down to his right-hand side quickly.
Frustration began to grow for supporters in the Tony Macaroni arena when Ayo Obileye was unable to make clean contact from just a couple of yards out, which saw a goal-line scramble end in the ball being cleared.
And this feeling was compounded just a few minutes later when Owura Edwards broke the deadlock 15 minutes from the end.
He headed home after forward Jordy Hwiula's shot hit the bar originally.
It ended up being the only goal of the game as Staggies picked up their first victory away to Livingston for over a decade.
Ross County boss Malky Mackay was full of praise for his team at full-time.
"I really enjoyed the nature of the win," he said.
“I always knew it was going to be difficult coming down here. We haven't won here in a decade, so I’m delighted to put a marker down as far as that is concerned.
"I’m delighted for the players, especially after Tuesday night where the character was at times questioned.
“I have a group here that I know are as good as anything in the Premiership, in our little section for want of a better word.
"We can compete with anyone, and we showed that today."
