Raith Rovers were left frustrated and out of pocket on Saturday as relentless overnight rain forced the call-off of their Scottish Cup quarter-final with Inverness.
The Kirkcaldy club had forked out over £3,000 for players and staff to stay in the Highlands on Friday night to give them the best possible chance of success in their all-important cup tie.
But while Rovers’ pre-match preparations appeared to be spot on, nothing could prepare for the unpredictable Scottish weather which took a turn for the worse and gave the game little chance of going ahead.
Match referee Willie Collum decided to postpone the clash following a 9am pitch inspection, bearing in mind the travelling distances involved and the fact that more rain was forecast later in the day, although hundreds of Raith fans had already started to make the journey north.
And with the match now rescheduled for tomorrow night (Tuesday) with a 7.45pm kick-off, it is thought only a small fraction of the Rovers faithful who had planned to head up the A9 at the weekend will now be able to attend the game.
Chief executive Eric Drysdale sympathised with everyone who had been inconvenienced over the weekend and confirmed that the club’s decision to travel up on Friday had unfortunately cost them dearly in the circumstances.
“It’s obviously disappointing but what can you do?” he noted.
“It’s money we can ill afford to lose but there are business risks associated with Scottish football and there’s not a lot we can do about it.
“We just have to get on with it and deal with the situation the best we can.
“At 4.30pm on Friday afternoon I spoke with Jim Falconer, the Inverness club secretary, because I was obviously aware of the weather forecast, but at that time it was windy and there was no rain so there was every indication it would be fine.
“Evidently though it was tipping it down overnight and when they got to the stadium on Saturday morning there were obviously areas of the pitch that were waterlogged.
“They initially tried to get a local referee out to do the inspection but we obviously wanted to get the match referee Willie Collum to do it, so he came from Nairn and had a close look at the pitch.
“Inverness had areas of the pitch covered for some reason and Grant (Murray) and Maurice (Malpas) were urging that the covers be removed to see if it was OK underneath, but when the covers were lifted it was obviously heavily waterlogged under there as well.
“The view that the referee took was that if it stayed fair all morning and the pitch was worked on all morning, there was a possibility that it wouldn’t been made playable.
“But with the weather forecast the way it was and the distances fans were travelling, it was decided it was best to call the game off.
“It’s most unfortunate for people who had travelled up early to make a weekend of it and had incurred costs here, there and everywhere.
“So it was particularly galling for them, but we managed to hold our subsidised buses at Kirkcaldy to ensure limited inconvenience for those people who decided to travel with the transport the club had arranged.
“We were also able to use social media to contact as many people as possible before their departure time in the morning and recommend to supporters that they didn’t set off on their travels.
“But of course we had a number of messages from supporters who were already on trains to Inverness or had pre-booked accommodation, so that is very unfortunate and we feel for those supporters.”
Following the postponement, Drysdale confirmed that Raith Rovers had requested that the game be played a week tomorrow to minimise inconvenience – but that was turned down.
“That was Inverness’ wishes,” he added.
“We wanted the following week, but we’ve now got to travel back up there on Tuesday and hopefully get a result.”
An Inverness club statement said on Saturday morning: “As always player safety is paramount to any decision taken but following incessant rain throughout the night, which we had hoped would bypass Inverness, and with the impending heavy rain forecast it would be unfair to ask fans of both clubs to travel if the game was at all in doubt.”
Any Raith fans who bought a ticket for Saturday’s game and cannot attend tomorrow’s rescheduled match can get a refund from Stark’s Park.
The same is true for anyone who arranged travel through the club.