The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Ferguson looking for a reaction after his first loss as Caley Jags boss
Boss Duncan Ferguson is urging Caley Thistle to react to their first defeat under him as they seek to return to winning ways at Hampden this weekend.
A 1-0 lead turned into a late 2-1 loss against Raith Rovers at the Caledonian Stadium on Saturday.
Billy Mckay’s headed opener was followed by Lewis Vaughan’s strike and Jamie Gullan’s stoppagetime winner from the spot.
In a weekend where most games were frozen off, the result shot Rovers to within one point of Championship leaders Dundee United and kept ICT seventh ahead of their Saturday trip to tackle off-form Queen’s Park in Glasgow.
Ferguson’s start to his managerial tenure at Inverness had amounted to three wins and three draws in the league and a 2-0 Scottish Cup victory over Cowdenbeath.
Being so close to beating title challengers Raith, who had not won on their previous 18 visits, was sore for Ferguson, who wants his players to take heed of where they went wrong in those key closing minutes.
He said: “We were going to lose a game. It was just about the way it happened. We pushed Raith all the way.
“Raith have only lost one game all season, but going into the 87th minute against us, they were losing their second game.
“Unfortunately, we couldn’t see the game out.
“We need to learn from that and learn from our mistakes and push on to the next game.”
Ferguson felt failing to double their advantage during their strongest spell opened the door for Raith to stage their dramatic comeback.
He said: first half “I thought the was a poor performance. Raith were much, much better than us.
“We managed to go in at half-time with a clean sheet. We were chuffed, because we knew we could do much better in the second half.
“In the second half, we had some good chances. We got our noses in front after scoring a good goal.
“Then we had a good chance on the counterattack in the second half with Luis (Longstaff), but he couldn’t quite get it away and the keeper (Kevin Dabrowski) made a good save.
“We also hit the bar (with
Max Anderson’s shot), but we just couldn’t get the second goal.
“We couldn’t clear our lines, especially for their penalty, when we had three or four chances to get rid of the ball.
“Losing with a penalty in the 94th minute was a tough way to lose, considering we’re on three points on the 87 th minute.
“Unfortunately, we couldn’t see the game out to get a draw. Once you concede one, don’t concede another one.”
Inverness will view their match against Queen’s Park at the national stadium on Saturday as a great chance to kick-start unbeaten run.
ICT are seventh in the table, while Queen’s Park, who won 2-1 in the Highlands on the opening day of the season, are winless in their last 10 games in all competitions.
Their last league victory was on August 19 when they won 1-0 at Arbroath.
The Spiders are level on 13 points with Caley Thistle on the same amount of fixtures, but sit one spot lower on goal difference.
It will be ICT’s first trip back to Hampden since they lost 3-1 to Celtic in last season’s Scottish Cup final in June.
anew