The seventh invasion of Ibrox: Match preview

By: Ian Rose | October 30th, 2008

I said it would be a big week, and so far it has been massive … a massive disappointment. Of the three big matches in eight days starting this Saturday past, two are done. A league loss to Motherwell that saw more unnecessary home points dropped, and a controversial (but no less poor) loss at Falkirk that took us out of the League Cup, once again in the quarterfinal round. Now, we face the biggest challenge of the three, a league trip to face Rangers. Luckily, we have a bit of positive history to look back on as we travel south to Glasgow.

Since promotion to the SPL, Caley Thistle have played six league games at Rangers’ Ibrox Stadium, and actually have one of the better SPL records there. We have only won once, a 1-0 win from a late Graham Bayne finish in October of 2006. But we’ve only lost there twice, by a combined three goals. The other three meetings were all 1-1 draws. Not bad for one of the least-funded teams in the league, traveling to one of the great fortresses of Europe.

Statistics are a bit less on the side of individual players than they are for the club. No current Caley player has scored a goal for us at Ibrox, our four goals there coming from Craig Dargo (2), Bayne, and a last-minute miracle from Bryan Prunty in 2005.

It would be hard to be optimistic, though, considering recent results and form. We’ve had what could be politely called a fairly piss-poor month, a month that saw four losses, no draws, no wins. Granted, every one of those losses was by a single goal, but that only makes them hurt more.

I make no claims on any kind of skill at prediction. One of the reasons for this is my devotion to my club – I can’t root against them, and when you make a prediction, at least part of you wants to be right, for that score to come true. So I don’t predict losses, and that would be fine if I didn’t support a team that lost fairly often. Anyway, I’m going to go with a 1-1 draw, because that’s the most that I can envision us getting from this one. A win would brighten my entire Autumn, but on their form, and on ours, I just can’t see it happening. We kept it close with Celtic in October – hopefully we can do the same at Ibrox, but it isn’t the best occasion to try and turn things around.

Then again, if it does happen, the effect it could have on our season … I’m not even going to think about that yet. Let’s keep it tight at the back and grab the chances we can. Mon the Caley.