Warriors not in the North Feb2025 ***GAME OFF***

[tm4tj]

League Leaders Don't Head North

 

GAME OFF DUE TO PARTS OF THE PITCH STILL FROZEN

Top of the table Stenhousemuir are the visitors this weekend at the Caledonian Stadium for a 2:00pm start looking to keep themselves as the leaders of the pack. In contrast, the Caley Jags will be looking to bounce back after they were whitewashed 3-0 at second placed Arbroath last weekend as we lost a little ground on the teams above us. It's a tight division this year with Arbroath probably looking the likeliest to get their act together as witnessed by the way they easily disposed of the Caley Jags last Saturday. Despite a good run of results, it's a sharp learning curve for most at this time, including the fans, where expectations will need to be tempered during the healing process.

 

 

 Don't forget it's an early kick-off at 2:00pm 

With that in mind, revised bar and bus times in operation this week. Everything is an hour earlier than normal.

Bar 94 will open at 1100 and close at 1700. 

 The matchday buses will leave the Bus Station at 1200 and 1315 

 Return from the stadium 10 mins after the full time whistle and at 1700. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Match/Ticket/Bus/Bar94/Info

Keith Bray to Dunfermline

***Early Kick Off 2:00pm***

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Venue H2H

Pld

Won

Drn

Lst

For

Agst

+ / -

Home	4	3	1	0	11	3	+8
Away	6	4	1	1	11	5	+6
Neutral	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Total	10	7	2	1	22	8	+14

Only the ten competitive matches against Stenhousemuir and this is the third one this season. We first crossed swords with the Warriors in a Scottish Cup tie in 1996 when we recorded a narrow one goal win, going on to play Rangers in the next round.

A tremendous victory for the Inverness side and a place in the last 8 of the cup. We 'scored' in 2 minutes through Thomson but Christie was offside. After that their defence had to withstand tremendous pressure. Mathieson was a real handful and he came close on 3 occasions - chances also fell to Brannigan, Sprott, Roseburgh, Aitken & Bannon. Caley Thistles only other first half chance was a shot from Thomson in 15 minutes but it went past.
In the second half Caley Thistle took control and in 53 minutes Thomson was unlucky when his 25 yard shot was tipped over.
In 60 minutes Stewart beat the offside trap but keeper McKenzie came off his line well. 2 minutes later a great shot from 18 yards by Christie was held by McKenzie. On 75 minutes Teasdale set off on a run down the right wing and sent a low cross to Brian Thomson just outside the penalty area - his shot into the corner was unstoppable. With a minute to go Stenhousemuir had the ball in the net but it was chalked off. Caley Thistle held out for a famous victory and the prospect of Rangers at home in the next round. ***We did of course play Rangers at Tannadice going down 3-0 in the Quarter Finals.

Starting XI

McKenzie Sprott Bannon Armstrong Brannigan Roseburgh Aitken Fisher Mathieson Hutchison Little

Jim Calder Mike Noble Richard Hastings Iain MacArthur John Scott Graeme Bennett Charlie Christie Mike Teasdale Alan Hercher Iain Stewart 75mins  Brian Thomson

Subs

Haddow Hunter Scott

Dave McGinlay Davie Ross Colin Mitchell

 

2024

Dec 21st	League (League 1)	1 - 0	A	719
Sep 28th	League (League 1)	0 - 0	H	1,601

2012

Sep 25th

League Cup (Rd 3)

p 1 - 1

A

705

1999

Jul 31st

League Cup (Round 1)

3 - 1

A

534

1998

Apr 11th	League	2 - 1	H	1,414
Feb 28th	League	3 - 0	A	463

1997

Nov 8th	League	4 - 1	H	1,669
Aug 30th	League	2 - 3	A	400
Aug 2nd	League Cup (Rd 1)	5 - 1	H	1,735

1996

Feb 17th

Scottish Cup (Rd 4)

1 - 0

A

2,300

 

INVERNESS CT  The Season So Far

D L  D D W D D D L   / W L(11)D W W W L  W L  

W W L  W W L  

Since Scott Kellacher was handed the reins in game 11, there has been a more positive approach to our matches which has resulted in improved performances and a more enjoyable matchday experience all round. Alas we were brought back to earth with a disappointing result in our last game of 2024, a crushing 1-4 defeat at home to Cove Rangers. We'll have to put that one down to a bad day at the office. However, we bounced back in our first game of the second half of the season in the six pointer against Dumbarton with a hard fought 2-0 win. That win over Dumbarton was a vital one and the introduction of Alfie Bavidge was a welcome one as he opened the scoring early in the first half. Charlie Gilmour slotted in the clincher in the second half to give us a cushion over the Sons and to narrow the gap on Annan to seven points. We took part in the only League1 game last weekend and came away from Annan with a resounding 3-0 win, Alfie Bavidge netting again with Keith Bray and then Billy Mckay from the spot.  *It was then on to Palmerston on the Tuesday night but in a five goal encounter we went down 3-2. Alfie Bavidge notched his third goal in three games and Keith Bray added a second but goals from Adam Brooks (2) and Jordan Allan kept the points in Dumfries. We bounced back with a resilient 1-2 win at Alloa in our third away game on the bounce, Dunfermline bound Keith Bray with his fourth of the season and Alfie Stewart. We got our revenge at home to QotS (1-0) with Alfie Bavidge scoring his fourth goal in five appearances. Alas it was a bridge too far at Arbroath last week and we went down losing three without reply.

Billy Mckay speaking to the Courier has said that Jake Davidson will miss the rest of the season after the extent of his knee injury was revealed to be more extensive than at first thought. Jake, who was shaping up well in midfield, was looking promising before his injury against Alloa Athletic in the middle of November and is now in rehab after his operation. The only other injury concern appears to be Billy himself who was subbed off at Arbroath last weekend as a precaution having come on as a second half sub at the break.

As far as signing anyone else: Billy said our hands are tied due to administration. We can only now get players in on loan as long as they are under 20 and the window closes at the end of the month.

 

Pos	Team	Pld	Gd	Pts
1	Stenny	24	9	38
2	Arbroath	22	10	37
3	Cove Rangers	23	10	35
4	Queen of Sth	24	-3	32
5	Kelty Hearts	22	7	31
6	Alloa Athletic	24	3	31
7	Montrose	24	-5	27
8	Annan Ath	24	-16	27
9	Inverness CT	24	0	22
10	Dumbarton	23	-15	08

 

<<<That was the Warriors line up in the 2-1 win over Queen of the South last weekend.

Warriors Last Six: W D D L  W W 

They started their last six with a resounding 3-1 win at Alloa at the end of December. There followed draws with Annan Athletic and Kelty before being hammered 4-0 at home by Cove. In February they have had a 3-0 win at Montrose and a home win over QotS (2-1) in their last game ahead of the visit to Inverness. That back to back wins have put the Warriors heads above the parapet again with Arbroath handily placed behind them with two games in hand. They also went out of the Cup at East End Park with the Pars easing through 3-0 in the middle of January.

Corey O'Donnell and Blair Alston are joint top scorers on six apiece with both scoring in the win over Queens last week. Matty Aitken is on 5 goals but has been out injured since before Xmas. Former Inverness player and man mountain Nat Wedderburn recently made his 150th appearance for Stenhousemuir.

 

The Warriors were due to come North looking to pillage three points from the Bridge and Castle but the Eagle will be doing his best to stop the looting and get the Admin Express back on track after the Smokies derailed us momentarily. 

As it happened, a touch of frost has postponed this one until 1945 on Tuesday 11 March. 

 

 

 

[tm4tj]

 

[The Mantis]

Oh dear. Game off. Lucky I never bought any train tickets today…

[tm4tj]

Luckily I never wrote a Preview....

Oh wait...

[Robert]

Rescheduled for 1945 on Tuesday 11 March. 

[tm4tj]

[bishbashbosh]

Off topic but the bbc alba live matches have been announced up to match day 11 out of 12 for the season. So far……..

 1. Montrose v QOS.        
 2 cove v Arbroath.   
 3 stennie v Alloa. 
 4 Annan v QOS.    
 5 QOS v Alloa. 
 6 Arbroath v QOS.  
 7 kelty v stennie. 
 8 Arbroath v kelty postponed weather    
 9 stennie v Arbroath.    
10 Dumbarton v Arbroath.   
11 cove v stennie.    
12 TBC.  
 

Times live game shown……arbroath 5, stennie QOS 4, Alloa cove kelty 2, Annan Montrose Dumbarton 1.

Only ict with zero appearances.

would a query to bbc alba from an official organisation get an answer as to why we have not been selected eg supporters trust.?

an away game for me or home game for others further a field. Bottle of beer and a curry in front of the telly in the warmth for a change.

You can tell I am suffering today from no footie syndrome.

[+CaleyD]

There will be a few things at play with the TV situation.

1.  BBC will be under no obligation to show every team.

2.  It costs them way more to send a camera/broadcasting crew to Inverness than anywhere else. Even more so since we removed all the TV infrastructure (camera towers etc).

3.  Like it or not, we're just not an interesting team for TV. We've no 'derby' opponents in this league and we've not been far enough up the table to be a contender at any point.  Nothing to draw viewing figures.

I suspect BBC will get another pick for the postponed game, and they'll be holding that and the other remaining slot to see what happens in the last couple of weeks.

At least one of those will go to a top of the table battle, but there's a chance the other is us. If nothing else exciting is happening and we're 'safe' then they might want to cover "The Great Escape" story...or if we're not safe and it comes down to the wire!!

At this level, I don't believe there's any extra income for clubs who are televised, so no financial benefit. In fact, being on TV has the opposite effect as it generally stops people attending and reduces gate income etc. So if we do get a TV game, we want an away one

[CaleyCanary]

Cove 3-1 Annan

Dumbarton 2-3 Montrose

Pity Dumbarton couldn’t hold out for the draw but it leaves Annan still only 5 points ahead of us and we now have a game in hand with a vastly superior goal difference.

[The Mantis]

I think the story with the Championship on a Friday night is 2 home games each making 20 games. As CaleyD says there doesn’t seem to be any such arrangement for Lge 1. Pretty obvious the no. of appearances correlates strongly with the league table. 

Edited February 15 by The Mantis

[tm4tj]

Pos	Team	Pld	Gd	Pts
1	Arbroath	23	13	40
2	Cove Rangers	24	12	38
3	Stenhousemuir	24	9	38
4	Alloa Athletic	25	5	34
5	Queen of the South	25	-6	32
6	Kelty Hearts	23	5	31
7	Montrose	25	-4	30
8	Annan Athletic	25	-18	27
9	Inverness Caledonian Thistle	24	0	22
10	Dumbarton	24	-16	08

• Alloa Athletic  2-0 Kelty Hearts
• Cove Rangers  3-1 Annan Athletic
• Dumbarton FC 2-3 Montrose
• Queen o  t Sth  0-3 Arbroath

[STFU]

I somehow managed to totally miss the news that the game was postponed and showed up. Then I thought I must have got it wrong with the 2pm kick off and that's why there was nobody around.

I'll be checking if I qualify for bringing a carer in future.

Edited February 16 by STFU