Defender says Inverness Caledonian Thistle's Premiership bid begins now
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With a place in the Scottish Cup final now secured, Robbie Deas says Inverness Caledonian Thistle’s attention has turned squarely back to earning promotion to the Premiership.
Inverness go into tonight’s final regular season match in the Championship knowing they must win against Ayr United to earn a spot in the promotion play-offs.
Any other result, and the Caley Jags will miss out, consigning them to at least another year of second-tier football.
The form book is certainly in ICT’s favour going into tonight’s match at the Caledonian Stadium, but with so much riding on a good result – and the prospect of several more mammoth moments awaiting in the play-offs if they get there – Deas believes another push essentially starts now.
“We’ve had a feel-good factor for a wee while now,” the 23-year-old centre back, who is nearing the end of his third season with Inverness, explained.
“We’ve been on a good run, but Ayr deserve to be in the position they’re in near the top of the table.
“I think everyone wrote us off a couple of months ago, and if you’d offered us a win on the last day of the season to make the play-offs we’d have bitten your hand off.
“Our goal is to get back to the Premiership, and that starts tonight.”
Deas has been a key figure in Caley Thistle successes over recent years, including a similar late-season charge last year that saw Inverness reach the play-off final in dramatic circumstances.
There, against St Johnstone, the Caley Jags were still in with a fighting chance with just 45 minutes left on the clock, before the magnitude of the run they had been on finally caught up with them.
That feeling has stuck with Deas and his teammates.
This year, then, he is determined to go one better and end a top flight absence for ICT that has lasted since 2017.
“There are a good group of boys who are still here from last year, and the hurt of the final is still in our minds,” he reasoned.
“We want to go one step further and get promoted this time.
“That disappointment is still in our heads.
“We’ve got a good core that went through that pain, and you don’t want to relive those moments in football – you want the feeling we had last Saturday.
“There are lots of good teams in the Championship, it’s a very difficult league, but our goal is just to get through tonight and see who we get on Tuesday.
“I said a few weeks ago that all our games were going to be cup finals, and this is another one. With the mood we’re all in I think we would fancy our chances against anyone.
“The two teams will be going at it, but the most important thing is us at the end of the day and we need to win.”
