TONY DINGWALL admits all illusions were shattered this summer as he waltzed into the Global Energy Stadium fully expecting to breeze back into the Ross County first team.

The 21-year-old local talent had revelled in a wonderful breakthrough season as part of the Staggies ensemble who turned a disastrous campaign on it's head in stirring fashion.

Like many a young player before him, it perhaps all came a little too easily for Dingwall - and he was in for a rude awakening.

Arriving back for pre-season training noticeably out-of-shape, manager Jim McIntyre quickly rooted him out.

It has since taken hard months of endeavour to win back favour and recapture the kind of first team starting opportunities that have reaped goals in successive games against Celtic and Motherwell.

As dismayed as he was in pre-season with Dingwall, County's brightest youth academy product in years, McIntyre has been thrilled by the youngster's determined response.

For the aptly-named hometown boy - a gifted wide player with abundance of tricks and flicks - harsh lessons have been learned.

"I knew myself I wasn't playing well (at the start of the season)," Dingwall admitted. "It just wasn't happening for me.

"The manager had a word with me and told me I had to try and get fitter. He told me to work hard and keep doing everything I could to improve, and then he'd give me my chance again.

"To that end, I've been doing extra work with the club's sports scientist, Ross Hughes, after training.

It's starting to pay off now."

For County, the league table had seemed somewhat galling over the last couple of weeks.

Having enjoyed what was, unquestionably, a startlingly good first couple of months to the campaign, a run of defeats to Caley Thistle, Dundee United and Celtic had drawn the Highlanders back into the congested mid-table pack.

Saturday, then, was always going to be viewed as a barometer of the Dingwall team's durability. It was a test they passed with flying colours, recording a seventh win from 10 at home this season and thoroughly outplaying Motherwell.

The Staggies front players also answered McIntyre's demand to be much more clinical in executing chances created.

"It was good to get a goal and three points," Dingwall acknowledged. "It was a tight game, but after the first-half we always felt we could get another goal. Once we did, we killed it off.

"We'd suffered three defeats in the league and of course it plays on the back of your mind. We knew we needed to try and turn it around and thankfully we did."

Dingwall helped engineer the opener before scoring superbly himself.

With the game grinding along unimpressively, the young wide man's aggressive trickery almost cut Motherwell open after 22 minutes, as he sliced inside and struck a shot against Motherwell legs.

From there, the ball broke to Martin Woods on the left and the County's midfielder's fine cross was controlled by Craig Curran with back to goal and the rocketed into the net from 12 yards.

Suddenly, the hesitancy in the hosts' play vanished and they began to move the ball far more confidently and authoritatively.

Dingwall would waltz a mazy path around goalkeeper Connor Ripley to score the second after 69 minutes, before Liam Boyce won and converted a deserved third in stoppage time.

Reflecting on his goal, Dingwall, healthily you might say, placed it in the context of continued first team involvement.

"I was sort of stretching for the ball, but it fell perfectly for me and I naturally went round the goalkeeper," he said.

"I knew I was coming off the field any moment and, thankfully, the substitution came just after I got a goal. Hopefully if I keep scoring I'll keep my place in the team.

"It was the type of game we knew we had to go and win if we were serious about being in the top six. We've now got another hard game against Aberdeen, so it was one we had to win."

Motherwell have just one win from the first five games under Mark McGhee, the Scotland assistant manager, but were without a wealth of experience in suspended Stephen McManus and injured Keith Lasley and Steven Hammell.

For another of their seasoned performers, striker Scott Mcdonald, Saturday was evidence again of the fine margins at play in Scotland's Premiership.

"It was 3-0, but I don't know if there were three goals in it. It was probably tighter than the scoreline suggests," Mcdonald stressed.

"We have to do certain things better and be more streetwise. We're in games all the time, but losing them on inches rather than miles.

"We need to get that right if were to have any chance of staying out of trouble this year.

"You need to be nastier - it's as simple as that. You have to have that in you and, the manager's saying it in there, if you haven't got that you won't play. We need winners.

"You can't teach people that - they have to want it themselves. Get to that ball. Every inch is important.

"We need to smarten our ideas up and be more difficult to beat. I'm confident, if we can get that right - we have bags of ability in that changing room.

"Their goal took a bit out of us but we came back out for the second half and were probably the better team until they scored again.

"There have been too many days like that so hopefully our luck turns.

"We have a tough game against Hearts not but we'll pick ourselves up and go again - there's a long, long way to go this season.

"We have a new manager in and things have been very positive."