Motherwell 0 - 1 Inverness Caledonian Thistle: Gregory Tade show helps Inverness put relegation fears behind them

TERRY Butcher loved his spell as manager at Motherwell. Yesterday he had another pretty enjoyable 90 minutes at his old stomping ground, albeit prowling and agitating from the visitors’ technical area as he cajoled his resurgent Inverness Caledonian Thistle charges to a hugely significant victory over his former club.

There is now clear daylight between the Highlanders and the SPL basement which they occupied for an awfully long time this season, and suddenly even a top-six finish is not beyond the realms of possibility particularly if they continue play as solidly as they did here.

Yet Butcher did not let the matter of a valuable three points distract from his genuine emotion at the death last week of Motherwell vice-chairman, stalwart and true gent Bill Dickie. “It was almost a perfect day,” he observed, “but I can’t set aside the sadness of Bill passing away. He was always at the tunnel at the end of a game and shaking people’s hands. I kept expecting him to be there today”. An immaculately observed minute’s silence prior to kick-off was a reminder of the respect that Dickie was held not only in these parts but across Scottish football.

But the game always goes on of course, and Butcher was naturally delighted at his side’s continued upward trajectory: “For us to come away with a win, a clean sheet and extend our unbeaten run it’s unbelievable – I didn’t know what to say the players afterwards,” he said.

All the emotions Butcher and his side were savouring after the final whistle were matched by the near polar opposite in the home camp. Motherwell have been in third spot for so long it’s almost become taken for granted that they would stay there for the entire season, but after a magnificent second-half strike from the mercurial Gregory Tade confirmed this latest in a string of indifferent home results, they found they had been dislodged from their perch by Hearts.

“We’ve had all the plaudits in the first half of the season,” said a quietly reflective Stuart McCall, the Motherwell manager, “but we know we’ve just got to knuckle down and get back to winning. I don’t think we deserved to lose today, but we didn’t have enough composure in front of goal in the first half and it’s a helluva strike from Tade to win it.”

With the fleet-of-foot Omar Daley and Jamie Murphy leading the way, it looked as though the Lanarkshire men were going to sweep Caley aside in the opening stages. Even after this initial hurricane blew itself out and Inverness slowly eased themselves back into the game, the pacey duo were still carving out some wonderful chances for themselves.

Two exemplary bursts into the box by each player came close to breaking the stalemate. Both saw the Motherwell strikers bear down on Ryan Esson but some excellent positioning and reflexes by the visitors’ goalkeeper saw him snuff out the danger. A corner which followed Daley’s effort produced what could only be described as a stramash in front of the Inverness goal and when Michael Hidgon latched onto the loose ball he seemed destined to score only for a flailing last-ditch clearance to carry it over the bar.

As these opportunities were spurned, Inverness were growing in belief and, having finished the first half on level terms, they moved to the front foot after the break.

Jonny Hayes was popping up on both sides of the park always willing to take on his opponents though his finishing wasn’t at its best on this occasion. Tade also carried menace with his galloping runs but he seemed to be living up to the criticism that is frequently levelled at him about not being clinical enough as he zoomed in on Darren Randolph but failed to beat the Motherwell goalkeeper despite having time to take aim.

But if you can’t put away the easy ones you will always be forgiven when you find the net with a screamer, which is exactly what the Frenchman did a couple of minutes later. Jinking into position some 25 yards out, he unleashed a corker that left Randolph sailing through the air with ball having already whizzed past him. “He either scores them or puts them into Wishaw,” joked Butcher.

Few in the ground could quibble with the quality of the strike but for the home fans there was a sense of Groundhog Day and their team was quickly falling out of it. Gone was all the urgency that permeated their play early on. Daley was replaced by Chris Humphrey but a few crosses into the Inverness box apart, there just wasn’t enough invention coming from McCall’s men.

The Highlanders pulled up the drawbridge in the closing stages, which did invite a lot of pressure if not a great deal of menace from the hosts. But with newly-formed central defensive partnership Kenny Gillet and Roman Golobar standing firm the game was closed out in textbook fashion to the delight of Butcher.