Caley Thistle manager John Robertson says the busy upcoming run of fixtures can be a rewarding one in pushing the Highlanders up the Championship table.
Inverness play the first of five games in 15 days when they host Alloa Athletic today, with a number of recently postponed fixtures having been rescheduled.
Caley Jags are aiming to play catch up having now fallen four points adrift of the promotion play-off spots, however, Robertson feels they can put themselves in a strong position if they capitalise on their games in hand.
Robertson said: “We had a little run earlier in the season where we picked up three wins and a draw. We need to pick up a similar type of run.
“It could come very quickly. We could shoot up the league in the next three weeks, because we will have at least five, or maybe six league matches.
“If we can win this weekend, and win the games in hand, we can get ourselves up into an area where we are in a position to challenge.
Inverness produced an excellent run of form when they experienced a hectic run of fixtures towards the end of Robertson’s first season back at Caledonian Stadium in 2017-18, resulting in them narrowly missing out on the play-offs.
Robertson has referenced the training notes for that period in an attempt to successfully navigate the upcoming schedule.
He added: “In my first season back, we were playing Saturday to Tuesday for the last five weeks of the season, and we ended up winning eight and drawing three.
“If we can go on a run like that now it would be perfect, it would get us to exactly where we need to be.
“We have already looked through the preparation we did, as we keep the training manuals. If we are at home on the Saturday, we will have a recovery session; if we are away we will give them the day off.
“On the Monday we went through match preparation to play on the Tuesday, but because of testing these games are now on the Wednesday.
“We will revisit how we approach the midweek matches, and revisit how we recover from them as they are both away from home. We will look back at our historical documents to see what worked back then and see if we can apply them going forward.”
Long-term absentees Kevin McHattie (hip) and Lewis Toshney (thigh) remain on the sidelines, but Robertson hopes to have both players available in the coming weeks.
Robertson says he will carefully manage his squad in the coming weeks to ensure nobody else joins them on the treatment table, and he added: “With the amount of games we have coming up, it would be pointless to risk somebody who is feeling a wee muscle injury, and suddenly they are out for five or six weeks.
“There are a couple of players we might not gamble on, to make sure they are available either for midweek or certainly the following Saturday.”
