Caley Thistle attacker Marley Watkins reckons all the pressure is on Dundee United for tomorrow night’s game at Tannadice after third-placed Inverness established a seven-point advantage on the Arabs following Saturday’s 3-3 draw against Kilmarnock.
The gap could have been greater had the Caley Jags not squandered the lead against Killie on three occasions, going ahead through Graeme Shinnie, Nick Ross and Danny Williams, but being pegged back by Nathan Eccleston, goalkeeper Ryan Esson’s own goal and Tope Obadeyi.
United fell to a 2-0 defeat against St Johnstone at the weekend, and host John Hughes’ men in Tayside tomorrow night.
Inverness have the chance to move 10 points clear of Jackie McNamara’s men and Watkins claims his side fears no team, having now gone nine matches unbeaten.
Watkins said: “It doesn’t change what we want to do, that’s beat Dundee United, it’s no different. We think we can win the match.
“It’s a must-win game for them and although we want to win, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if we drew.
“The unbeaten run definitely brings confidence. But also we’ve got to watch out to make sure we keep to those high standards, because teams will be determined to end this run.
“We’ve got to rise to the challenge and make sure that doesn’t happen. We’ve been quality this season – we just want to maintain those standards.”
The Caledonian Stadium surface was poor and Watkins felt that made it difficult for his side to click into its normal passing rhythm.
The 24 year-old added: “I was frustrated with the pitch, it was like running on sinking sand at times. I’m not making excuses but there’s no short grass. There’s nothing we can do about that. I just prefer good pitches.
“We didn’t get the rub of the green and it felt as though we weren’t meant to win on Saturday, for some reason. It was frustrating.”
Hughes handed a debut to 20-year-old attacker Calum Ferguson, with the Canadian being given the final 16 minutes of action to make an impression.
Inverness are still without a senior attacker following the £150,000 sale of leading-scorer Billy Mckay to Wigan Athletic last month, with Hughes running the rule over Dutch attacker Prince Rajcomar and Serbian forward Marko Vukanovic who are both on trial.