CHARLIE CHRISTIE - Promotion dream is alive and kicking for Inverness Caley Thistle
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
When the Championship results appeared at 4.45pm on Saturday, March 18 and Inverness had lost away at table topping Queens Park I thought any chance of a play-off place had evaporated for us. How wrong I was.
That defeat in mid-March saw us slip to seventh, nine points behind fourth placed Partick Thistle and with a negative goal difference of minus two. Even the most optimistic of ICT supporters would have been concerned at how our season was unfolding at that time, but six consecutive wins have put us right in the mix.
Make no mistake – winning six consecutive matches in any league is hugely impressive, but in the Championship even more so given the unpredictable nature of teams on any given match day.
The hard-earned win at second-bottom Hamilton exemplified this and sets us up perfectly for two massive home games against Dundee tomorrow and Ayr United on May 5. It was also our first win over Accies in five attempts this season, and part of me couldn’t help but think where we might have been if we had turned one of those Hamilton defeats into a win.
The dream of a title win is still mathematically possible but studying the remaining fixtures it would take a minor miracle for us to finish as champions.
Dundee and Queen’s Park face off on the final day and, prior to that, Dundee have a home match against struggling Cove Rangers and I cannot see them both dropping enough points for us to pip them to the trophy. But let’s not get greedy – a play-off berth is now in our hands, and we need to take care of those remaining two league fixtures to confirm our participation in them.
In the Scottish Premiership the post-split fixtures will be announced after this weekend’s round of games with the first of the remaining five matches played on May 6 and 7, and the final one scheduled for the weekend of May 27 and 28 prior to the Scottish Cup final the following Saturday.
Ross County along with Kilmarnock and Dundee United will be waiting anxiously on that fixture announcement as all three look to avoid relegation from the top flight along with St Johnstone who are five points clear of bottom spot.
Home advantage can be a telling factor as teams go into these remaining matches as is aptly displayed by the fact that Kilmarnock have yet to win an away match all season and have only managed two points from a possible 48 on the road thus far.
They are likely to have three of their five post-split fixtures at home on their dreadful artificial surface and will badly need to make that count.
Ross County are likely to be one of their opponents at Rugby Park, and that game may well prove significant.
