Top v Bottom Again

 

For the second week in a row Inverness face table toppers. This time it's Alloa Athletic after our win over last weeks toppers at Cove. Now into plus figures, the Caley Jags can focus on the teams directly above them in the knowledge that they can compete with the best in this league after the shackles have been taken off, the legacy from the Duncball era no longer restricting them on the park. It won't all be plain sailing, but those that witnessed the second half at Cove have said this was the best performance for a couple of years. A word of warning, Alloa come North unbeaten away from home on League1 business. For us, it's onwards and upwards as they say at the bottom end of the table.

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Going to the game today?

Then drop your donation into Bar94 12:00 - 2:30pm to help the Community Development Trust to provide as many Festive Hampers as possible. The Community Development Trust holds free Christmas Lunches at the Stadium for elderly fans and delivers hampers to vulnerable and deserving fans in the lead up to Christmas. Please donate if you can to help make someones Xmas that little bit better.  

Click HERE for more detail.

 

Venue

Pld

Won

Drn

Lst

For

Agst

+ / -

Home	20	8	10	2	36	22	+14
Away	23	11	6	6	47	24	+23
Neutral	1	0	1	0	4	4	0
Total	44	19	17	8	87	50	+37

Looking at the stats, a draw seems to be the favoured result over the last three encounters with goals in every game. Overall, in a previous life the Caley Jags used to get the better of the Wasps but times have changed. They seem to be a more resilient side at the moment and wins breed confidence, that's why they find themselves leading the pack in the chase for promotion to the Championship.

Last 10 Competitive Meetings

2 - 2 (A)

1 - 1 (A)

2 - 2 (H)

1 - 2 (A)

0 - 2 (A)

1 - 1 (H)

3 - 2 (A)

2 - 0 (A)

2 - 2 (H)

3 - 0 (H)

The last encounter at Recreation Park ended all square when we threw away a two goal advantage after the introduction of seasoned campaigner Conor Sammon. Wasps Buzzing:  2-2 Inverness were without Charlie Gilmour, Flynn Duffy, Paul Allan, Ethan Cairns and Lewis Nicolson for the trip to Alloa although Jack Newman, Luis Longstaff and Keith Bray have returned to the squad after injury. Alloa have plenty experience in their ranks, notably Conor Sammon and Kevin Cawley and went in to this encounter off the back of a superb win over Partick Thistle last weekend in the Challenge Cup. Sammon started on the bench with Cawley joined by Luke Donnelly up front. Danny Devine gave Inverness an early lead with a tremendous birthday boy volley into the corner. Calum Macleod added a second but a few minutes later we were level when substitute Sammon and Luke Donnelly scored for the Wasps and despite a frantic last twenty minutes, that's how it ended.

Our Season so Far on the park

INVERNESS CT:  D L D D W D D D L  / W L D W  Our season got off to a slow start with a draw at home to Dumbarton followed by a penalty defeat at Annan. Another two draws against Montrose (h) and Kelty Hearts (a) before our first win of the season over Queen of the South at the Caledonian Stadium. We beat Stirling Albion 3-0 to send us into a fourth Rnd tie away to Livingston thanks to a brace from Adam Brooks and a strike from Adam MacKinnon. That was followed up by us throwing away a two goal lead at Alloa to end up with a 2-2 draw six minutes later. A Danny Devine volley and Calum MacLeod with his first goal for the club were the scorers at Recreation Park. Last time out we had a disappointing 1-1 draw at home against Cove Rangers who opened the scoring through Adam Emslie. James Nolan on loan from Manchester United's youth squad levelled the game before the hour. Next up was a home game against Stenhousemuir. Quite frankly this was a dull game with neither side able to score although Musa Dibaga did make a wonderful penalty save in the first half. Relegated Arbroath was our final game of the opening round of fixtures and despite creating enough chances, we came away from Gayfield with our second defeat of the League1 campaign. Away from League duty last weekend, we put up a good fight against Livingston in the Challenge Cup at Almondvale but lost out 5-4 in a penalty shoot-out after it finished 2-2 over the ninety minutes. Paul Allan and Charlie Gilmour were our scorers during the ninety minutes.

Our first game in the second round of fixtures turned out to be Duncan Ferguson's last stand. It ended like his first game in charge, a win as we defeated Annan 1-0 at home. Administration and management removal followed by five players being released and fifteen points being wiped off our total. First game after Admin was at Dumbarton with Scott Kellacher as head coach and Billy Mckay his assistant on and off the park. Alas it ended in a 3-1 defeat after a promising first hour. Kelty Hearts came North next and went away with a point in a 1-1 draw. Kell's got his first win in week (unlucky for some)13, a deserved 2-1 win at top of the table Cove Rangers. Alloa up next at Inverness in matchday 14...

ALLOA Athletic: D D W W D D WD L  / W L W D  Alloa had an eight game unbeaten start to League1. They began the League campaign with draws at home to Queen of the South and away to Dumbarton followed by a home win over Stenhousemuir and another win away to Annan at the same ground we lost 1-0. They drew 0-0 at Gayfield and the following week was Challenge Cup action and Alloa pulled off a shock 1-3 win over Partick Thistle who had opened the scoring through our olde 'friend' Brian Graham. However, three second half goals from Kevin Cawley (65', 76') and Scott Taggart (90'+5 pen) gave the Wasps a tremendous result and a home tie against Arbroath in the next round which they also won (1-0). That was Cawley's 79th & 80th goals for Alloa. Our first meeting with the Wasps ended 2-2 after we were two up. Meh! A win over Kelty followed by a draw at Montrose before Cove dished out their first defeat. However they followed that with a win away to Stenhousemuir before Arbroath gained revenge for the Challenge Cup defeat winning 1-0 for Alloa's second League defeat. November saw them hammer Annan 5-0 before drawing with Queens. In midweek they bowed out of the Challenge cup going down 1-0 at Championship side Dunfermline.

League1 Fixtures all 3:00pm this Saturday

Pos	Team	Pld	Gd	Pts
1	Alloa Athletic	13	6	21
2	Cove Rangers	13	5	20
3	Kelty Hearts	13	8	19
4	Arbroath	13	0	19
5	Stenny	13	1	18
6	Queen of Sth	13	-2	18
7	Montrose	13	2	17
8	Annan Ath	13	-13	14
9	Dumbarton	13	-6	12
10	Inverness CT	13	-1	+1

 

Latest Team News

With Scott Kellacher getting the first win under his belt at Cove, hopes are high for another upset at home against Alloa who currently top the table. Charlie Gilmour returned at Cove and our goals were made in the Western Isles thanks to Adam MacKinnon and Keith Bray. Connall Ewan and Lewis Nicolson missed out last week. Former Caley Jags keeper Michael Fraser has been offering advice to cult keeper Musa Dibaga since Goalie Coach Stuart Garden was dismissed in administration.

Waiting for official team news.....

 

Alloa's team versus Dunfermline in the Challenge Cup in midweek is shown below. I notice that the keeper was a busy man starting and on the bench.  A first half strike from McCann was enough to put the Pars into the semi-final. Noted that Sammon and Cawley started on the bench and keeper PJ Morrison was missing since we last played them, presumably Ogayi getting some game time. Connor Sammon, Luke Donnelly and Luke Rankin all have four League goals. Incidentally, defender Danny Devine tops our League1 scoring chart with three goals.

 

 

Another excellent and entertaining performance from the lads today.  They are playing well as a team and playing a style of football which not only is more entertaining to watch, it seems to be much better suited to the strengths of the players. RiG sums it up brilliantly with his post.

I hope Davidson's injury is not as bad as it looked.  He was playing very well prior to that.  It says a lot about the change in approach that he got injured when trying to block a clearance by the opposition keeper.

49 minutes ago, RiG said:

It speaks volumes of how bad a manager Ferguson is / was that we seem to have a better chance of staying up after he's gone despite a fifteen point deduction. 

Let’s confine DF to the dustbin of history and concentrate on driving the team on to survival this season.

That was a better performance from the team than any I saw last season in the championship.

Edge of the seat stuff and a thoroughly entertaining watch.

(And the referee wasn't so bad - quite fair I thought, and he took a dim view of our blatant dives and time-wasting tactics towards the end, which, lets face it, would have had our fans howling if the roles were reversed!)

Not a bad player in blue and red on the park today, but by a whisker I'd say Longstaff on the wing and Dibaga in goal tied for my man of the match.

We're gonna make the playoffs - you saw it here first!!!

32 minutes ago, buckett said:

That was a better performance from the team than any I saw last season in the championship.

Edge of the seat stuff and a thoroughly entertaining watch.

Not a bad player in blue and red on the park today.

We're gonna make the playoffs - you saw it here first!!!

I agree with what I have left in your post bucket but think you been celebrating tonight and getting carried away about the playoffs  happy to be proved wrong at the end of the season though!

13 hours ago, buckett said:

That was a better performance from the team than any I saw last season in the championship.

Edge of the seat stuff and a thoroughly entertaining watch.

(And the referee wasn't so bad - quite fair I thought, and he took a dim view of our blatant dives and time-wasting tactics towards the end, which, lets face it, would have had our fans howling if the roles were reversed!)

Not a bad player in blue and red on the park today, but by a whisker I'd say Longstaff on the wing and Dibaga in goal tied for my man of the match.

We're gonna make the playoffs - you saw it here first!!!

Agree about the ref. Only decision I really want to see again is when their keeper took out Longstaff as it looked a definite penalty and I think the ref has bottled making the call.

Didn't like our time wasting and we ended up with silly bookings as a result. Understand why it happens but hope it doesn't cost us with suspensions later in the season.

 

1 hour ago, STFU said:

Agree about the ref. Only decision I really want to see again is when their keeper took out Longstaff as it looked a definite penalty and I think the ref has bottled making the call.

Didn't like our time wasting and we ended up with silly bookings as a result. Understand why it happens but hope it doesn't cost us with suspensions later in the season.

Looked like a definite penalty to me as the keeper just took Longstaff out with little attempt to play the ball. Only 1 of our bookings was for time wasting,  Nolan, and it looked like that was because the linesman/ref refused to let us put a sub on. The bookings for Gilmour and Billy were extremely harsh and systematic of a poor referee.

I wasn't convinced by any of our penalty shouts. The fans, including me, made more of Luis' appeal than any of the players did. I thought Nolan could just as easily have been booked for his theatrical dive. 

Good deserved win and another clean sheet. Musa took the weight off the defence with a few catches as Alloa tried to salvage something.

10 minutes ago, Huisdean said:

Looked like a definite penalty to me as the keeper just took Longstaff out with little attempt to play the ball. Only 1 of our bookings was for time wasting,  Nolan, and it looked like that was because the linesman/ref refused to let us put a sub on. The bookings for Gilmour and Billy were extremely harsh and systematic of a poor referee.

Looked like they were just time-wasting initially at the free kick - surely they would have decided to do the substitution when the kick was awarded, but no, the ref was wise to it. I'm all for playing them at their own game when it comes to running the clock down - but we need to work on it, it came across as pretty amateur and we were punished for it.

On two occasions we tried to chip it into the corner from free kicks and both times it went straight out of play and the ball just came straight back at us.

Could've been costly at the end as were were dropping deeper and giving up a lot of the ball.

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
Table after matchday 14. Off to Dumfries next Saturday
1.	Kelty Hearts	14	6	4	4	23	13	22
2.	Arbroath	14	6	4	4	17	16	22
3.	Alloa Athletic	14	5	6	3	17	12	21
4.	Stenhousemuir	14	6	3	5	17	15	21
5.	Cove Rangers	14	6	2	6	23	19	20
6.	Q.O.S.	14	5	3	6	12	15	18
7.	Montrose	14	4	5	5	12	11	17
8.	Dumbarton	14	3	6	5	19	24	15
9.	Annan Athletic	14	4	2	8	9	24	14
10.	Inverness CT	14	4	7	3	12	12	4

6 hours ago, STFU said:

Agree about the ref. Only decision I really want to see again is when their keeper took out Longstaff as it looked a definite penalty and I think the ref has bottled making the call.

Didn't like our time wasting and we ended up with silly bookings as a result. Understand why it happens but hope it doesn't cost us with suspensions later in the season.

Looked to me like Longstaff was waiting for the tackle and made the best of it. The way he moved his arms made his fall look just a wee bit too dramatic and the referee dismissed it as simulation.

Although delighted with the win I really wish they wouldn't resort to this time-wasting. Go for another goal instead! And ffs stop doing that carry-on at the corner flag. It's not entertaining to watch and unless you're really good at it, (Premiership standard, at least!) you just end up losing possession.

Stop it!

It's not big and it's not clever!

😆

Dog Falls MotM Charlie Gilmour can be seen here presenting Julie with a few tinnies for the next away day...

 

 

22 hours ago, RiG said:

It speaks volumes of how bad a manager Ferguson is / was that we seem to have a better chance of staying up after he's gone despite a fifteen point deduction. 

And when Ferguson arrived, Scot Gardiner went out of his way publicly to claim “credit” for the appointment.

The way I look at it is to add the deducted points back. I know it is pointless, but it does give you an idea of how we measure up against the others. That we could be 3 points off the top after a poor start and plenty of the season to play tells you how well we are doing in relative terms. If we keep this up we will catch those above in due course and then it's all to play for.

 

On 11/16/2024 at 6:00 PM, Robert said:

A well deserved win.

I thought we were excellent in the first half, but was worried when Alloa had a spell early in the second when we were taking risks and getting lucky at the back.

We got back on top and Gilmour took his goal well, and you could see how much it meant to all the players.

We then closed the game out, despite the best efforts of the referee. Mckay was very unlucky not to be on the score sheet and we hit the post.

Longstaff is a player transformed now we are playing him wide again, and was outstanding when playing on the left. Gilmour and Thompson were very good too, and credit Dibaga for the clean sheet and running the clock down.

We seem more streetwise under Kellacher too.

A very satisfactory afternoon (despite the referee). 

This is great to hear …on the occasions I have seen him play live, I felt he was a decent player...it feels a bit like what happened last year to Nathan Shaw, played centrally as a 'play-maker' but losing the benefits of him being out wide.

Probably the one concern is we have just the one experienced striker in McKay.... Cairns will need some opportunities to come on as sub a bit earlier, also what's the score with Charlie Reilly, he still seems to be with us, but he suffered a serious injury didn't he?

5 hours ago, Eagle4Caley said:

This is great to hear …on the occasions I have seen him play live, I felt he was a decent player...it feels a bit like what happened last year to Nathan Shaw, played centrally as a 'play-maker' but losing the benefits of him being out wide.

Probably the one concern is we have just the one experienced striker in McKay.... Cairns will need some opportunities to come on as sub a bit earlier, also what's the score with Charlie Reilly, he still seems to be with us, but he suffered a serious injury didn't he?

MacKinnon will be our top scorer end of the season just you see. Scott has told him to have a dig if he gets a chance and he hit the post this week and put one just wide in the first half. He just sits in the pocket and has some kind of boot on him. He'll finish on 10 plus - that's my prediction. He reminds me a bit of Polworth in the way he plays but I think he has more about him.

34 minutes ago, ClickbaitProponent said:

MacKinnon will be our top scorer end of the season just you see. Scott has told him to have a dig if he gets a chance and he hit the post this week and put one just wide in the first half. He just sits in the pocket and has some kind of boot on him. He'll finish on 10 plus - that's my prediction. He reminds me a bit of Polworth in the way he plays but I think he has more about him.

Easy to see how that could happen, especially if we don’t start getting more goals from strikers.

Top scorers in league matches:

3 - Devine

2 - MacKinnon 

1 - various others including Billy

Charlie Gilmour deservedly named in the SPFL Team of the Week. 

What a great month it's been for football so far - 2 wins (and a draw) for ICT and 2 wins for Scotland!!

Can it get better?