RORY LOY revealed he used the new centre of English football to get fit for Falkirk's William Hill Scottish Cup final against Inverness Caley at Hampden on Saturday.

The 27-year-old striker has signed a pre-contract with Dundee, and his career with the Bairns looked like being over after he sustained an ankle injury in the 1-0 quarter-final win over Queen of the South at Palmerston in March.

However, a trip to St George's Park in Staffordshire, the £100million state-of-the-art training home of England's national teams, for rehabilitation, has paid dividends.

Loy, who scored 12 goals before being sidelined, played part of an exhibition game for the Championship side in Swansea last week and is in contention to start against Caley Thistle.

He said: "When I went down to St George's and found it was more of a stress fracture rather than a stress reaction, I knew it was going to take a few more weeks.

"But a few more weeks have gone now and I am back training and hopefully it turns out well.

"I worked Monday to Thursday, all day. In the afternoons it was fitness work. It was in the altitude chamber where they starve you of oxygen and put you on the bike - it's not nice - then towards the latter part of the second week they get you outside running.

"It was a good eight days in total, it got me sweating and got the fitness up.

"When I broke a leg at Carlisle I went to Lilleshall, which is a similar sort of set-up, and it was very beneficial.

"I feel good. I feel like most players would feel after 12 weeks out, a bit stiff.

"But I have trained the last few days and getting back out on the pitch and running about is only going to do you good.

"Whether it is starting, or on the bench, I don't know what the manager is thinking,.

"Hopefully I can go and play a part in a cup-winning side."

Loy is desperate to leave Falkirk fans with their first cup win since 1957 before he begins a three-year stint at Dundee.

He said: "The fans have been great with me. I have never felt any extra pressure, nor heard anyone doubting me.

"Obviously signing elsewhere, it could create the impression that maybe I had chucked it in, as they say, but that is far from the case.

"People who know me and the boys in the dressing room know I have been dying to get back.

"And how hard I work on a Saturday hopefully proves that I want to do as much as I can for Falkirk and I will certainly be doing the same on Saturday, however much I am involved, if at all."