Paul McGowan, the Dundee midfielder, has branded the team “weak” in every aspect and fears they don’t have the guts to survive a looming relegation dogfight.

McGowan offered an astonishingly frank assessment in the wake of Friday night’s humiliating 7-0 massacre by Aberdeen in front of the TV cameras at Dens Park.

Paul Hartley’s side shamed themselves with a pitiful performance which led to hordes of Dark Blues supporters streaming out at half-time with their side already trailing 4-0 by that stage.

The Dons rubbed salt in the host’s wounds as defender Andy Considine notched a first hat-trick for Derek McInes’ visitors as Dundee suffered their heaviest defeat since losing 8-1 to Jock Stein’s Celtic in 1971.

It made for a miserable March for the Taysider’s who have endured four straight losses and are now in danger of being sucked into a scrap to stay in the Premiership.

McGowan pulled no punches afterwards and admits he doubts whether they have the bottle to cope with a fight for survival in the weeks ahead.

“Where do you start?” he said. “It’s embarrassing. We’ve embarrassed ourselves, we’ve embarrassed the club, we’ve embarrassed the fans.

“It’s indefensible. Right throughout the team, every one of us, we should all take a hard look at ourselves in the mirror because that was not acceptable. It’s probably the worst I’ve been involved in. It will hurt for a long time.

“We go to Ross County now on Tuesday and it can dent the boys’ confidence because it’s only going to get harder. We’re actually kidding ourselves on just now. The way we train – we go and try to pass the ball, everybody wants it. Then when we go to a game nobody’s there, it’s as if we’re hiding.

“From strikers, through the midfield, to defenders – every one of us, we’re weak as anything. That’s the only way I can sum it up. Right through the team we are weak. Mentally weak. When the going gets tough we’ve got nothing about us. You might think I’m being harsh but it’s a harsh reality. This is a dogfight.

“I honestly don’t know if we’ve got the guts to get out of the situation we’re in. That’s the scary thing. You can shout, you can scream as loud as you want. But at the end of the day if it’s not in there it’s not in there.”

Not surprisingly McInnes was delighted with the appetite and application of his players and likened his side’s thrashing of Dundee to their training sessions, such was the freedom that his men played with on the night. Some of their passing and movement was a joy to behold, and McInnes wants that care-free air to remain.

“Once you get Johnny Hayes, Niall McGinn, Ryan Jack and boys like that enjoying a game, then it’s hard to contain them,” McInnes said.

“We asked them to and play like we see in training every day, and I thought we did that against Dundee.

“People were tight up against them and they were giving it to each other and trusting each other,” he said. “It was a fantastic performance.”