If anybody knows what it’s like to be a part of Caley Thistle, it’s Natalie Bodiam.
The 35-year-old has played for the Caley Jags ever since 2019 – when the club took over Inverness City, who Bodiam had previously turned out for for more than decade.
It was her association with the Highlanders which saw her secure her “dream job” after she went back to college aged 30 to study sports therapy.
“It’s a good connection for the women’s team to have,” Bodiam said. “It’s what helped me get my job in the first place.
“I knew the Caley CEO Scot (Gardiner) through doing the kit launches because they’d always get one of the female players involved.
“That opened doors for me to get my job as a massage therapist at the club.”
Playing and working for ICT
Bodiam loves her job and the exhilarating experiences she gets because of it, such as Caley Thistle’s upcoming Scottish Cup semi-final against Falkirk on April 29.
“It’s my dream job,” Bodiam said. “I wake up every day looking forward to going to work.
“It’s just such an adventure getting to go away with the team to all the different stadiums.
“We’ve got the Scottish Cup semi-final coming up and that’s going to be such a big game at Hampden.
“For me, that’s going to be such an amazing experience – not many folks get to experience that kind of game behind-the-scenes like that.”
The club boast a good relationship with the women’s team, Bodiam says, and she believes her job has helped create a stronger link between the men’s and women’s teams.
“I think being under the Caley Thistle banner has given us a boost,” Bodiam said.
“We get more limelight which is always good for women’s football.
“I’ve got a really good relationship with everybody at the club.
“With playing on a Sunday, I’ll come in for work on Monday and the boys will be asking how we’ve got on.
“They show an interest in our team which is really nice.”
Coming up against Scotland’s best and ICT’s ambitions
Back in the Inverness City days, Bodiam and her team-mates played at the highest level in Scotland in the SWPL, as she recalls coming up against the league giants in their first game after promotion.
“There’s a moment we all come back to and can have a laugh about,” Bodiam said.
“When we first got promoted, our very first game was against Glasgow City.
“We somehow went 1-0 up and we thought here we go – it’s our first game and we’re going to beat the best team in Scotland.
“We ended up getting beat 10-1 but for that five minutes we were ahead, it was such a buzz.
“At that point, Glasgow City had Rachel Corsie and other big players, who are still playing for Scotland now.”
With Caley Thistle now playing in the Scottish third-tier – the SWF Championship – Bodiam hopes one day they will secure promotion back to the highest level.
And although the forward admits this campaign hasn’t gone the way they had originally wanted, Bodiam believes it has provided Inverness a foundation to build on next season.
Caley Thistle are in the midst of a good run of form, having won three consecutive league games – against Greenock Morton twice and Dryburgh – for the first time this season.
“Every season we go into, it’s with the plan of pushing for promotion,” Bodiam said.
“The national Championship structure has maybe been a bit higher than we expected.
“You look at the results in the league and everybody’s been taking points off each other, you just can’t predict what way games are going to go.
“It’s been a very high level and I think that means we’ll be better prepared for what’s to come next season.
“We’ll go into that wanting to push for that promotion spot.”
Inverness travel to SWF Championship league-leaders Livingston on Sunday.
Conversation