Caley Thistle midfielder Joe Chalmers on long journeys down the A9 and hoping for ‘one of the best games of the season’

Joe Chalmers remembers the duvet days on board the team bus and long trips up and down the A9.

Those supposed hardships have repeatedly been cited by past players as a crucial ingredient in Caley Thistle’s team spirit and success.

Close bonds were formed by long hours on the road, and sometimes in hotels, for away trips and there would have been a sense of deja vu for Chalmers yesterday as the team bus set off for Dumfries.

Having starred for the club for two seasons from July 2017, the silky playmaker returned to the Highland club in the summer.

The 466-mile round trip is the longest they will face in League One this season, but Chalmers believes the experience will benefit squad newcomers and veterans of the road alike.

Back in Inverness after spells at Ross County, Ayr United and Dunfermline, the 31-year-old midfielder said: “This is probably our longest journey, travelling down to Queen of the South, and it’s the only game where we’ll stay overnight beforehand.

“That’s something you look forward to as a player.

“You get down to a hotel with your teammates, and the bus journey itself, you really enjoy that.

“Although it is a long drive, it’s a fixture where you get good team bonding and you can get a good laugh with people.

“That’s always been a big part of life at Caley Thistle and success has been bred upon it.

“If you can get a result, it makes it even better on the journey back up the road.

“If you go down there and get a result, it can be one of the best games of the season.”

While road trips are a plus, they say there is no better way to bond a squad than winning games of football.

Caley Jags are showing a knack for it with 10 wins and three defeats in all competitions so far.

Keeping feelgood factor going

Chalmers, as a naturally creative midfielder who loves to feed the team’s attacking play, is playing a big part in that, with Scott Kellacher’s flowing football perfectly suited to his style.

Winning, just as the club emerges from administration, has certainly forged a feelgood factor.

Chalmers said: “Wins create those bonds too. Everybody just feels a bit more relaxed.

“There isn’t as much pressure, and we are all able to express ourselves a bit more.

“When you’re losing, you can put too much pressure on yourself and everything becomes a bit more hard work.

“When you’re winning, it’s the best thing for everyone.

“Obviously our first aim of the season was to wipe out the minus-five points, which we managed to do really quickly, and then it was to get in among the pack.

“We’re already near the top, so we have achieved our early goals pretty well. We just need to kick on now.

“It’s still early in the season, there’s a long way to go, so we just need to keep this positive feeling we’ve got around the club and amongst the squad, and keep everyone moving in the same direction.”

Chalmers, for all the good vibes, knows how tough Palmerston could be.

The Doonhamers sit level with ICT on 10 points, one behind early leaders Stenhousemuir.

Chalmers said: “It will be a different test altogether from Cove Rangers last week.

“Cove haven’t been on a great run, so they played a lot more defensively to try and stop us, whereas I would expect Queen of the South to come and have more of a go because they’ve been doing pretty well.

“We need to be ready for that, and I think it will be a completely different game from what we had last Saturday.

“There have been games where we maybe haven’t created as much as we would have liked, but we always feel pretty secure at the back.

“If we do manage to nick a goal, we always have the confidence that one goal could be enough.

“There’s nothing worse than playing in a team where you always feel like you’re chasing games, but at the back the boys are doing a great job which gives us a platform to go and do our jobs.”

[Source: Press and Journal]