Cammy Harper is confident Caley Thistle will be inspired by testing Celtic in the Scottish Cup final – then aims to join the champions in the Premiership.
Inverness were beaten 3-1 in Hampden’s showpiece match on Saturday and it’s a short summer break for the squad, who had almost a month to wait before fixtures.
Their Championship season ended with a 2-1 home defeat against Ayr United on May 5, which ended any promotion play-off hopes and saw Billy Dodds’ side finish in sixth position.
Inverness were eight points behind champions Dundee, but only three points below runners-up Ayr United in a campaign badly affected by the volume of injuries.
Promotion push tops target for ICT
Harper, who unlike many of his team-mates, is under contract until the end of next season, says the side have got a taste for taking on the best in the country.
He said: “We make it pretty clear every year in the Championship that it is our aim to be up there and be promoted.
“We fell short this season, but we had bad luck along the way with injuries, but that’s what we’re wanting, to play the best teams in the country regularly.
“A few boys will move on, but there will be boys staying. It will be another rebuild to replace the players who move on.
“I have another year left, so I’ll be looking to kick on again for another promotion push.”
Fine margins when you take on best
Inverness made Celtic work for their treble-clinching trophy win, with their resistance broken by Kyogo Furuhashi seven minutes before the break.
A more front-foot approach from ICT asked more questions of the Hoops in the second half, but a quick breakaway led to Liel Abada making it 2-0 on 65 minutes.
A terrifically worked move with minutes left led to Dan MacKay powering home a header, as he did in the semi-final against Falkirk.
However, Jota soon added a third to dash any hopes of a late leveller from the Caley Jags, who won the trophy in 2015.
Youth academy graduate Harper was fairly satisfied with the performance, although the way the goals were conceded was a source of frustration.
He said: “For large spells of the game, we frustrated Celtic, and we did ourselves fairly proud.
“We could have been more of a threat, attacking-wise. They are Premiership champions and a really good side, but we gave a good account of ourselves on the biggest stage.
“I felt we could have perhaps made it harder for them, in terms of the goals we conceded.
“The fine margins are being switched on for 90 minutes.
“We had maybe a couple of lapses in concentration and Celtic got their goals, so all credit to the boys.”
Strong performance against Hoops
And Harper took heart from his own display against the energetic frontmen of Celtic.
He added: “You know going into the final against Celtic, you’re going to have to have a good game.
“I am proud of my performance, going up against some top-quality wingers and I thought I held myself in good account.”
Conversation