This Saturday, almost two years ago to the day in which James Vincent ensured he would never have to buy a drink in Inverness again, he will have a chance to endear himself to the good folks of the capital of Highlands once again.
Times have changed at the mouth of the River Ness since Vincent scored the winning goal in the club’s famous Scottish Cup triumph of 2015. He himself has moved onto pastures new, now turning out for Dundee, and Inverness’s day in the Hampden sun is but a fading memory as the club cling on to their Premiership status by their fingernails.
The win for Richie Foran’s men over Vincent’s new club on Wednesday night has given them renewed hope that they can still overhaul eleventh-placed Hamilton, who sit one point ahead with one game to go. And as fate would have it, it is Dundee who Inverness will be relying on to do them a turn in Lanarkshire, bearing in mind that they will have to do their own duty by beating Motherwell at home to stand any chance of an unlikely reprieve.
While insisting that his own focus is on ending the season on a high for Dundee, Vincent admits that the chance to help his friends avoid the drop would be a welcome by-product of a victory.
“You don’t want to see your old teams do badly,” Vincent said. “If you leave on good terms then I don’t think anyone would want their old team to struggle. Hopefully we can get a result and after that it is up to Inverness.
“I speak to quite a few of the boys; David Raven, Ross Draper, Billy McKay and Aaron Doran. I speak to them all. We were there together for three or four years so you build relationships.
“We are going to want to win the game and if that helps then so be it but we want to win the game ourselves and to do the right things.
“They have given themselves a chance and we will see what happens at the weekend. We will be doing everything we can to win the game.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Inverness striker Billy McKay has repeated the mantra of manager Richie Foran that is now Hamilton who should be feeling twitchy about their perilous Premiership predicament.
“All the pressure is on Hamilton because it’s in their hands,” said McKay. “If they win, they stay up and go into the play-offs. It’s as simple as that.
“What happens is up to them and hopefully that pressure can get to them a little bit. We have had this for a few weeks now and it is a different situation for Hamilton.
“Maybe in their minds, they thought that we weren’t really going to get back into it. But we have.”
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