Stuart Findlay: Thanks for the memories, but if Caley Thistle have a serious chance of moving to a new home they should grasp it with both hands

Press and Journal

25-04-2025

It's perfectly normal to have an emotional attachment to a building.
When the time comes to leave, whether that's moving to a new house or a different place of work I'll feel a lump in my throat at the prospect.
So I'm not taking it lightly when I say this: if there is a realistic chance of Caley Thistle moving on to another home in Inverness, they should take the plunge.
I remember Dennis Wyness's Scottish Cup winner against Celtic.
I remember running onto the pitch with hundreds (thousands?) of others when John Robertson's team held off St Johnstone to clinch promotion to the top flight for the first time.
There was the first taste of European football in the Highlands against Astra Giurgiu (result aside) and Barry Wilson's goal against Dunfermline in the inaugural SPL encounter in Inverness in January 2005.
The good times have been really, really good.
But as a football fan, it's only natural to look around at what's happening elsewhere and wonder if it could all be a bit different.
For the longest time, my favourite place to watch Caley Thistle was in the away terrace at Victoria Park.
Those Highland derbies against Ross County were intense affairs. And through the 2000s, Inverness usually came out on top.
But my favourite part was that ICT fans were in Dingwall.
They weren't just a little more animated, they were like a different group of people altogether.
County's Jail End roared and Inverness fans roared straight back, backing their team and dishing it out to players like Tony Bullock.
Now, it's not unusual for away fans to be noisier. They're usually the more hardcore element of the support.
And for Inverness, playing Ross County was the only away game that wasn't a huge ordeal geographically to get to.
But you can't ignore the other factors.
The tighter pitch, the fans being closer to it, the fact that Victoria Park is next to a pub and a train station.
It all adds up to a far greater sense of occasion as a supporter when you're part of a large group of fans walking towards the ground.
Now, don't get me wrong.
There have been plenty of times where the Caledonian Stadium has knocked it out of the park without it needing to be a momentous occasion on the pitch.
I remember a Liam Boyce hat-trick en route to County winning 3-2 in Inverness on a baking hot August day.
OK, the result wasn't great. But the conditions were perfect and pre-match walk from the Chieftain was a delight.
But most of the Scottish football season isn't played on days like that.
Playing so close to the Moray Firth means the stadium can be a very windy place indeed.
It's tucked away in a place that's not very easy to get to. And the stands are all much further away from the pitch than they should be.
There are a lot of different reasons why the club hasn't been able to kick on from the 2015 Scottish Cup success and grow the fanbase.
The thousands of Old Firm fans in the city are undoubtedly a big factor, for instance. But I can't help but feel it would have been an easier sell for fans if the matchday atmosphere was just… better.
I know what you're probably thinking.
There is an absolutely massive elephant in the room. The club is in administration and fighting for its very survival.
So my thinking is purely hypothetical. There's a fair chance that it makes absolutely no financial sense to consider moving to a new ground while everything is still so up in the air.
But the potential unlocking of huge swathes of land at Ashton Farm, close to Inverness Campus, presents an interesting prospect.
A tie-in with Highland Council, HIE and others to provide sports facilities could open the door to a community stadium that may solve some of the club's long-standing issues.
It's not the Bught and it might not be perfect.
But as long as it's in Inverness, I'm ready to roll the dice.
Stuart Findlay lives in Inverness and works as a journalist for the Press and Journal.