Inverness Caledonian Thistle ready to battle St Mirren in Scottish Cup
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James Vincent insists Inverness Caledonian Thistle have plenty of quality to break down a stubborn St Mirren side in Paisley.
Caley Thistle are trying to reach the last eight of the Scottish Cup for the third season in a row, but they will need to knock out a second consecutive Premiership side to get there after beating Ross County in the last round.
The Buddies just missed out on a top six berth in the top flight, but Inverness are on an eight-match unbeaten run and will fancy their chances of getting a result.
“You’ve always got to go into the cup games thinking you can win,” Vincent said.
“We know St Mirren have had a good season – I’ve watched them a couple of times, they play football the right way and Jim Goodwin seems like a really good manager.
“We’ve knocked out one Premiership team already, so we’re looking to do it again.
“We just need to gear up, get ourselves sorted and we know we’ve got the quality in the team that if we stay tight on the day, we can compete with the majority of teams.”
Vincent and the rest of the Caley Jags squad are no strangers to Goodwin’s teams, having come up against his Alloa Athletic side in the Championship.
That means there will be no surprises tonight.
“We have that insight into how Jim Goodwin works, and I think that can help in our lads’ favour,” Vincent reasoned.
“He always got Alloa playing football the right way, and St Mirren try to play football too.
“We will look at their patterns of play and who their key individuals are, and we’ll try and combat that, shift the game to our strengths and get the result we need.”
Vincent himself has great memories in the competition after scoring the winning goal in the 2015 final, and as the club has continued to do well in the last few seasons he says it is easy to get excited for cup games.
“There’s an affiliation with us and the cup,” he added.
“We’ve always done well, it has always been that motivation and that drive to perform and do well for ourselves, the club and the fans.
“We know how important it is to a club like this.
“Financially it’s fantastic, for the boys it’s brilliant – you want to go and win stuff – and the club wants to be competing at the higher end of competitions and in the higher leagues.
“That’s the main focus throughout the whole club, and fortunately it’s something that everyone unites around to work for the same thing.”
