INVERNESS HAVE probably been the SPL’s surprise package so far, but Dundee boss Barry Smith is one of the few people who perhaps saw Caley’s superb run coming.
Smith has great respect for what Terry Butcher and his assistant Maurice Malpas have achieved with the Highlanders and believes the calibre of Caley’s coaching team means they were always capable of being up there challenging this season.
One defeat in the last 13 league games sees Inverness sitting in third in the table and just five points off top spot, but Smith is concentrating on a completely different five-point deficit as he prepares to take his players north tomorrow.
That’s the margin between the Dark Blues and St Mirren in 11th place, although Smith believes his team can edge closer to safety by taking a good result from their daunting trip to the Tulloch Caledonian Stadium.
“I know Terry and Maurice and they are good coaches so in that sense they haven’t surprised me, but given the start to the season they had it’s a great run that they are on,” he said.
“We know it’s going to be a difficult game but I think we can go up there with confidence. Inverness are on a great run just now and it’s a difficult place to go, but we’ve got to go up there and recognise that there were good things that came out of our other game with them.”
Smith was referring to the last time the teams met in October, when Inverness ran out convincing 4-1 winners at Dens Park.
However, the scoreline didn’t tell the full story as Dundee found themselves two goals down after just seven minutes.
They quickly pulled it back to 2-1 and created some gilt-edged chances to level only to see Caley net twice in the final 10 minutes to earn all three points.
Smith noted: “It’s important to get a good start in any game, not just because it’s Inverness, but we recognise that when we lose early goals in the manner in which we did it makes our job a lot more difficult.
“But for spells in that game we took the game to Inverness and at 2-1, on another day we could maybe take a chance and it would be a different story.
One player Dundee will no doubt have to shackle is Inverness’ Billy McKay, whose hat-trick against Dundee United last Saturday took his tally to a remarkable 16 for the season.
Smith confirmed that striker Steven Milne will not be involved tomorrow as he continues to recover from a torn stomach muscle, although defender Lewis Toshney should be available.
The on-loan Celtic man required staples after suffering a head wound in training on Tuesday but will make the trip north.
csmith@thecourier.co.uk