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Alloa Dump Sad Inverness The Wasps dumped Inverness out of the League Cup with a 1-0 win at the Indodrill Recreation Park Stadium. This was another inept display by Richie Foran's side who were given another chance en block to make amends for their poor showing at Partick, but nothing changed as the League One side scrambled the winner in the first half through Jason Marr. The visitors were unable to take control of the game and struggled to create much of note and Alloa held on for the win. Congratulations to Alloa who continue a six game winning streak since relegation at the end of last season. Shame on you Inverness who appear to be clueless with Richie Foran's honeymoon period coming to an end quicker than expected. We had a couple of keen observers on hand to relate the tale. Alternative Maryhill and Rig saw it like this and put their thoughts down on paper. Very poor tonight said A M. Going forward, Mulraney looked lightweight and on the rare occasion where he managed to get space to cross, his final ball was poor. King was slightly better, but the potential impact of both players seemed to be limited by the fact that they were played on the wrong wings - Mulraney, as a pacey left footer, should surely be allowed to use his pace to get to the bye-line and swing balls in with his left foot, while King contributed little from the left in the first half but looked a bit more effective when he was eventually switched to the right in the second. Where we really lost the game, though, was in the centre of the park: Polworth looked OK driving forward but both his and Tansey's distribution was poor, and neither seemed able to anticipate passes played into their opponents' feet or impose themselves physically; we at least had more of the play when Draper came on in the second half. We also allowed Alloa to push us back too deep in the first half in particular, and while they didn't create too many chances, there was too much scrappy, last ditch defending. McNaughton reads the game well, but his distribution was poor tonight, and he doesn't dominate opposing attackers the way Meekings can. As soon as Meekings is fit, he needs to come back into the team, and after tonight, Foran will hopefully also accept that we are a stronger team when Draper starts, whether it is Vigurs, Polworth or Mulraney who gives way. It was good to see Doran back as a second-half sub, although he didn't do a great deal, and Fisher had a few good touches and might be worth a start in place of Boden, who had a poor evening. Rig added: Not really much else to add other than we seemed utterly intent on trying to force the ball up the middle of the pitch which was bizarre given that we actually have wingers for the first time in forever to try and whip crosses in. In the second half especially, after Doran had come on and King was switched to the right flank (presumably to stop him cutting inside all the time from the left) we still tried to go right down the throat of the Alloa side and with Goodwin in there that was always going to be a tall order. Really strange that we didn't try and stretch Alloa more by playing with more width but given how excellent they were last night in a defensive sense I think they still would have held firm quite easily. The second half was like one of those overload training exercises given how much of the ball we had and how often we were camped in the Alloa side of the pitch. That said, it is also an exercise we would have failed badly at given how wasteful we were with the ball. Over the course of the 90 minutes I can recall a good shot in the first half from Polworth, a Vigurs (half?) volley in the second after a Fisher knock down and a late effort poked wide by Vigurs and that was it really. Fifteen shots on goal and only two on target. That's very poor. I thought Alloa were superb. You can argue they didn't offer too much in an attacking sense particularly in the second half but they were fantastic across the back completely neutralising our (limited) attacking play and their midfield dominated for most of the game although we got a wee bit of an edge back when Draper came on. Still, all the possession we had is only good if you do something with it. Our wasteful attacking play meant we didn't deserve to go through and Alloa rightly progressed. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thanks guys. A hugely disappointing result for Inverness and with a local derby coming up this weekend, no time to dwell on this result. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Venue: Recreation Park, Alloa, Date 09th August 2016, kick off 19:30 Alloa Athletic - 1 (Jason Marr 28) Starting Xl: Parry, Taggart, Waters, Graham, Marr, Goodwin, Longworth (Cawley 46) Robertson, Spence (Layne 81), Kirkpatrick (Holmes 76), Flannigan. Subs: McDowall, Wilson, Hoggan, Hetherington, Holmes, Layne, Cawley. Inverness CT - 0 Starting XI: Fon Williams; Raven, McNaughton, Warren, Tremarco, Tansey, Polworth (Doran 74), King, Vigurs, Mulraney (Draper 46), Boden (Fisher 60), Subs: Mackay, Horner, Brown, Draper, Doran, Sutherland, Fisher. Referee: Don Robertson Crowd: 613