Jim McIntyre Pleased To Stop Rot For Ross County In Highland Derby

Ross County manager Jim McIntyre was pleased to end the wait for a Highland derby win.

McIntyre's side deservedly beat Inverness 2-1 away from home to book their place in the last four of the Scottish League Cup.

Jackson Irvine opened the scoring for County four minutes before the break and Michael Gardyne doubled their lead three minutes after.

Greg Tansey pulled a goal back for Inverness in the closing stages, but County were worthy winner.

I'm thrilled. It's been a long time coming. In four attempts we hadn't won,'' McIntyre said.

It's nice to get that monkey off our back and some of our play was fantastic - we should have scored more goals.

But while the score is at 2-0 it can become nervous and that's the way the game panned out. Jacko scored a great header and I thought in the second half we were excellent.

We controlled most of it. We had some real good opportunities to kill the game, but unfortunately for us we never took them.''

His counterpart John Hughes was again left bemoaning his side's lack of creativity up front, with too few chances fashioned to threaten Gary Woods.

Bar Tansey's goal and Ryan Christie's effort which came back off a post, Caley Thistle struggled to create chances and it cost them a spot in the semi-finals.

I felt for long periods of the first half we controlled the game, but once again we need to create more chances,'' said Hughes, who again could only name five substitutes.

I'm disappointed with the first goal from a set-piece and then the second goal killed us. It gave us a mountain to climb.

Ross County were a hard opposition tonight and played it in a great manner.''