Former Liverpool and Newcastle United youth Luis Longstaff looking for injury-free campaign with Inverness Caley Thistle to improve on goal return
Inverness Caledonian Thistle winger Luis Longstaff says his main goal for the 2025/26 campaign is to stay injury-free and contribute more goals and assists for the team.
The 24-year-old winger was one of the first names on the teamsheet in what was a very young Caley Thistle squad last season, but saw his gametime limited after the turn of the year in particular.
Although he made 31 appearances across all competitions, just nine of those came in 2025 as he battled long-term injury.
When he was on the park, Longstaff felt he could have done more regardless, registering three goals and three assists in those games.
Having returned to action before the end of last season, though, and now in the midst of pre-season, Longstaff feels he is well-placed to kick on personally and improve his returns as long as he does not encounter any further fitness setbacks.
“Going into next season, for me the goal is to try and stay as fit as possible and not pick up niggling injuries that keep you out for three or four weeks at a time,” he stressed.
“If I can do that, I want to get my numbers up a bit more. I thought I played pretty well last season, but I think I only got three goals and three assists, which isn’t that great.
“I think I can improve on that quite a lot. I’m going to set myself some targets before the start of next season, and keep track of that to see where we’re at by the end of it.
“I’ve done that at times, but not every season before. This season I think I’m going to really be quite on it and sit down with the manager at some point so that we both know what I want from this season.
“I think that will be better to get him involved rather than just doing it on my own, then we can keep going back to it throughout the season.
“I’m in a place where I’m happy playing football, which always helps. That’s a good starting point, and I’ve done a lot of fitness work over the off-season to try and get as fit as I can be.”
While more goals and assists on a personal note will undoubtedly help the team pick up results in League One this season, Longstaff does not feel drastic changes need to be implemented for it to be a successful campaign for the club.
“I just think we’ve got to carry on with what we did for most of last season,” he added.
“Some games obviously weren’t as good as others last season, but the majority of the time I think we were pretty good as a team.
“If we can build on that a little bit more, I think we’re in pretty good shape.”
