A Look Into Histories

A LOOK INTO HISTORY TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY

INVERNESS CALEDONIAN THISTLE’S ONLY EUROPEAN GAME

Inverness, the capital of the Highlands is where two clubs were formed, Inverness Thistle in 1885 and Caledonian a year later both becoming founder members of the Highland League. Inverness Thistle narrowly missed election to the Scottish League in 1973 but in 1994 the two clubs merged as Caledonian Thistle playing at Telford Street Park the home of Caledonian. In 1996-97 the club changed to its present name, Inverness Caledonian Thistle moving to the purpose built Caledonian Park.

In 2004 a slow and steady progress found them promoted to the Premier Division and in 2015 they won the Scottish Cup with a 2-1 defeat of Falkirk at Hampden Park. That entitled them to enter the Europa League and in their tie they drew Astra Giugiu from Romania.

Our Match Programme, an extremely colourful and glossy production of 66 pages was was issued for £5 for the 1st leg on 16th July 2015. First advert was their sponsor – Subway !
John Hughes, the Manager had his say, then Kenny Cameron the Chairman with the Scottish Cup not surprisingly appearing on nearly every page. Club News followed and New Boys on the Block then a very comprehensive section on the opposition with full pen-pictures. Six pages of Scottish Cup celebration included a huge centre page colour spread of the victorious team. Match Reports of pre-season friendlies, commercial News, Youth Department, In the Community, players sponsors, half-time quiz, View from the Press Box, 2015-16 fixtures, Captains column and, of course, the team line-ups. In fact, so much to read that fans would be doing so well into the night. 5,534 attended the game, the best Home crowd of 2015-16. Astra Giurgia won 1-0.z

500 fans travelled to Romania for the second leg which ended 0-0 so Astra Giurgiu went through to meet West Ham United and won that. In 0ctober 2014 Inverness Caledonian Thistle went into administration and now found themselves in Division One. Nevertheless, things got worse for Astra Giurgia tumbling down the pyramid of football of Romania then when their Owner could not hold on to his possession, they were dissolved.

On a downward spiral from Premier to Division One, Caley Thistle found themselves in administration on October 24th 2024 not only losing Manager Darren Ferguson and a number of players but 15 points, then, on 26th they met Dumbarton FC who had been in last place and lost 1-3 with most of the season yet to come.
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