Malky Mackay braced for fixture 'carnage' at Ross County brought on by Scottish Premiership postponements
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
Malky Mackay says Ross County’s schedule will be “carnage” over the next few months as a result of postponements.
The Staggies are due to travel to Dundee tonight for a match that was originally due to be played at the start of October, only to fall victim to Storm Agnes.
A second inclement spell last weekend, which included amber and red weather warnings as Storm Babet wreaked havoc across the country, then forced the postponement of County’s match against St Mirren.
With a traditionally busy schedule around Christmas and New Year in British football anyway, plus now extra matches being squeezed into midweek gaps in the calendar, it will be non-stop for County between now and January.
Mackay, and some members of his squad, will be used to it from their time in England’s lower leagues.
However, that does not change the fact that playing twice-a-week on multiple occasions in a short space of time will have an impact on the fitness levels in Dingwall.
“(Despite our strength in depth) we actually haven’t had to sit four or five in the stand yet because of the normality of football where every week there are issues,” Mackay said.
“That’s just the rigours of professional football. I don’t want to get to the point we’re down to bare bones, but with Saturday and Tuesday games constantly – from my career down in the English Championship where that happens all the time – it impacts your squad.
“Collisions happen in every game, and it can be something completely innocuous.
“You can think everyone’s fine, then all of a sudden 15 minutes after the game the physio comes up to me and tells me news I don’t want to hear.
“That will be even more so the case when we’re playing so frequently, so even after coming out of this period of games it will be full on for us until the Christmas break.
“It will be eight or nine weeks of carnage ahead.”
