Head coach backs Caley Thistle midfielder to bounce back after being sent off
HEAD coach Scott Kellacher has tipped Robbie Thompson to bounce back after he was sent off in the first half in the 2-0 defeat to Arbroath.
Thompson picked up two yellow cards in the first half which saw him sent off 10 minutes before half time with the score at 0-0.
He received a yellow card after 18 minutes for a challenge on Ryan Flynn, before stopping a counter attack when he held Fraser Taylor as referee Colin Steven gave him a second booking resulting in a red card.
Kellacher says it was a harsh lesson for Thompson to learn from, but says he will learn from the experience.
He said: “Robbie is a young lad and he will learn from it, these things have happened to more experienced players in football. It is important he takes it on the chin.
“It did change the game for us and that is the frustrating thing.
“The first yellow card was very harsh, he won the ball clearly and I have not had a chance to speak to the referee about that. But it is his decision at the end of the day.
“I don’t know where he is meant to put his leg. He has won the ball and his momentum has taken him through. I thought he might take a moment to think about the decision.
“But the second one is a booking and there is no getting away from it. If you pull someone down you get booked for it. Experience tells you to let him go as he still had 75 metres to go.”
Dylan Smith, who is on loan at Arbroath from Ross County, gave the visitors the lead early in the second half before Gavin Reilly scored in injury time to give Arbroath all three points.
Kellacher says it was a frustrating afternoon for Inverness after being unable to take their chances.
He said: “We know how hard every game is going to be. We started the game well enough and were in control of the game and the sending off changes the game. We tried to be positive with the shape we went.
“I thought we were comfortable and you can see how much it meant to them coming up and beating us.
“Teams are desperate to beat us, it is a hard one to take as in the second half, as much as we had 10 men, it became a scrappy game which they wanted.
“We had to be patient and get a chance. We need to work our way up the pitch and get into the final third to get a chance. It is a frustrating one, but that is football.
But gutted as we were all positive before the game and we are positive afterwards. We will get setbacks. The hard part is they didn’t cause much problems at open play. But we pick ourselves up and go again Monday. We have targets where we want to get to. There will be bumps along the way. It is hard to take.”