He points out that the possibility of extra time in cup-ties means that could effectively mean a 10-game programme — St Johnstone will hit that mark in the space of just 33 day if their Challenge Cup visit to Ross County on Wednesday is level after 90 minutes.

Dundee have actually come through that period relatively unscathed, with only Ludovic Roy picking up an injury serious enough to force him to miss matches.

However, with no game this weekend because of the international card, a combination of fatigue and minor knocks has prompted Alex to give his men three extra days off, and the first-team squad will not be training until Thursday.

“Over the last couple of weeks, we have been patching boys up and just about getting them through 90 minutes and it’s because the games have been coming so thick and fast they’ve not had proper time to recover,” he said.

“I’m delighted with the way my players have handled it and to come through unbeaten in the league was a big ask, but it does not make the number of games they’ve had to play right.

“Eight in a month is ridiculous and they should look at this. It does not do players any good, it does not do clubs at our level who usually have small squads any good, and it does not do the fans any good.

“Our supporters have been absolutely unbelievable the way they’ve stuck with us and I can’t praise them enough because they’ve been asked to fork out a lot of cash to follow their team over the last month.

“At times, what they’ve seen will not have been as good as you would like, but how can you expect standards to be high when boys are almost out on their feet?”

While most of the Dens squad will have their feet up for a few days, Paul Dixon will be busy after being called into the Scotland U/21 squad for games against Finland on Saturday and Denmark next week.