St. Johnstone are having an absolutely superb season. Fifth in the table as we head for the split, there is an excellent chance they will qualify for next season's Europa League. All this despite the lowest average attendance in the SPL (up by only 150 from last season, despite their considerable success), and despite losing their manager, Derek McInnes, to Bristol City in October, they have gone from strength to strength under their new boss, former Manchester City and West Ham midfielder Steve Lomas.
They came to the Highlands last midweek, and ground out a 1-0 win through a Francisco Sandaza penalty. The spotkick decision was debatable, and Caley Thistle spurned a few excellent chances, but the fact is that Saints, without playing particularly well, always looked comfortable and in control. Whilst target man forward Cillian Sheridan offers them an out-ball when they are under pressure, midfield duo Jody Morris and Murray Davidson (injured last week) are sufficiently comfortable in possession that Lomas' team are not displeasing on the eye.
What Caley Thistle fans would give for a team which vaguely resembles the side assembled 100 miles down the A9 at McDiarmid Park.
The last nine days summed up Inverness' season; it started with a 1-0 win at Pittodrie where ICT dominated the first half and then, after the sending off of young full-back Josh Meekings, a heroic backs-to-the-wall defensive effort to hang on with ten men for 34 minutes against what was, admittedly, an abysmal Aberdeen side who, to quote Blackadder, offered as much creativity as a group of blind hedgehogs...in a bag.
That was a first win in seven matches. Any raised hopes among the support were dented by the loss to St Johnstone in midweek, then well and truly trampled on by a 3-2 loss to struggling Hibernian on Sunday. An utterly dominant first half from the home side produced no goals, and though ICT took the lead early in the second half through a penalty - their first since November 2010 - they collapsed after Hibs earned a cheap equalizer and lost 3-2. Hibs managed all of three clear-cut chances in the entire game.
After 32 games, Inverness have 31 points - a total which is no better than they had at this point three years ago, as they lurched towards relegation. Their goal difference is worse than it was then, too. We can count ourselves lucky that, this time around, the ineptitude of Hibernian and Dunfermline has made demotion an extremely remote possibility. But it has also acted as a smokescreen for what has been a hugely disappointing campaign for Terry Butcher.
Last season's seventh place finish raised expectations amongst the support, and Butcher only stoked them further with grandiose talk of making the top six. In order to achieve this, he gutted the squad, most controversially releasing seasoned veterans Grant Munro and Russell Duncan. Both signed for Ross County, where Duncan has barely featured; centre-back Grant Munro, on the other hand, is huge favourite to be the first division's player of the year. Munro has not been adequately replaced. Neither, unsurprisingly, has striker Adam Rooney, who left to try his luck with Birmingham City.
The arrival of players like cultured Welsh international Owain Tudur Jones from Norwich, and Irish winger Aaron Doran from Blackburn, were supposed to be part of a change in style from a robust, direct team to an eloquent, passing side, not least since he replaced the 6'2" Rooney with 5'7" Northampton forward Billy McKay. McKay has scored a grand total of one goal, having played 1,187 minutes of football this season. He has spurned a lot of chances. But he has also hardly benefitted from a constant stream of high balls aimed at him which are meat and drink to the centre-backs marking him. Doran and Jones have missed much of the season with injury, as has centre-back Chris Hogg and arguably the most impressive signing of last summer, midfielder Andy Shinnie.
But you can only blame so much of Caley's current woes on injuries. The style of play has been hideous; at times this season home games have been unwatchable. Several of Butcher's signings, including a number of loanees, have been a complete waste of time. Some of our emerging young players, Nick Ross and Shane Sutherland, have regressed, not helped by being in and out of the team; others such as captain Richie Foran and summer signing Greg Tansey, seem undroppable whatever they do. The personnel in the backline may have constantly chopped and changed, but the manager and his assistant, Maurice Malpas, are two former international defenders who don't seem able to organize a defence. And up front, even when we are creating chances, our forwards can't take them - yet, as shown by the stats of McKay I quoted earlier, the boss still picks them.
Worst of all, the performance in the win against Aberdeen showed a level of desire and character that has been all too rare as the season has progressed. The players certainly look disorganized. Increasingly, they look demotivated. The current situation reminds me of the end of the 2007-08 season, where a run of 3 wins in 16 games (2 of which came against ailing Gretna) set off a few alarm bells. The club stuck with Craig Brewster till January 2009 - his dismissal came ultimately too late to stave off the dreaded drop.
Butcher has now been manager of Inverness for more than three years. Is this season just, as I hope, a blip on the radar? Or is it, as I fear, a sign that he has taken Caley Thistle as far as he can, and that we're headed for a downward spiral that could make us relegation favourites next time around?
L.
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