Can Ross County avoid back-to-back relegations?
· Yahoo Sports
"It's the worst result in the club's history, the worst performance in the club's history."
Ross County manager Stuart Kettlewell went thermonuclear last weekend as his side were thumped 4-0 at home by fellow relegation strugglers Airdrieonians.
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It was an abject scoreline for County, who are bottom of the Scottish Championship and now face the very real possibility of a second successive relegation.
All such a far cry from the start of the season when the recruitment of experienced second-tier players like Ross Docherty and Declan Gallagher was being lauded. They had held on to their top striker Ronan Hale too.
County were backed by many to bounce back to the Premiership at the first time of asking but instead they look destined to be sucked into the quicksand of League 1.
Former player Don Cowie started the campaign as manager, despite being at the wheel when the ship went down. He was the local boy done good, entrusted with the responsibility of returning County to the top flight.
It took nine games for County to record their first league win. Not good enough. Cowie walked the plank.
In his place came the experienced Tony Docherty but that did not work out either. Even with former St Johnstone boss Callum Davidson as his right-hand man, the County vessel continued to take in water.
The final act for Docherty and Davidson was a 6-0 defeat by Raith Rovers in December, with prodigal son Stuart Kettlewell answering the rescue call.
Recently dismissed by Kilmarnock, his arrival looked like the final roll of the dice.
It was back to the future for County, a nod to the glory days of the not-so-long-ago when Kettlewell and co-manager – now chief executive – Steven Ferguson guided Ross County to the Championship crown back in 2019.
Early signs were promising. In his first game back – in front of the BBC Scotland cameras – County downed high-flying Partick Thistle 2-0.
Defeats followed to St Johnstone and Motherwell in cup competitions, no shame there.
The embers were flickering, with three wins from their next six league matches. However, the past six have been winless. Four of those have been defeats.
That 4-0 loss to relegation rivals Airdrie tells a grim story and Kettlewell's strong words felt like a desperate attempt to salvage something. Anything.
A final 'Hail Mary', full of hope for a reaction rather than expectation. Can it stir an unlikely rally from a moribund squad?
If only they could take a leaf out of the Queen's Park book.
After losing their best player Josh Fowler in the January window, few predicted the Spiders would climb out of their web of misery at the bottom of the table.
But a run of four wins from six games in February and March transformed their season and suddenly they had a glimpse of making the promotion play-off places.
Form has tailed off slightly but just two defeats in their past nine matches means they remain buoyant and last week they held league leaders St Johnstone to a 1-1 draw in Perth.
County can get off the bottom of the table with a win on Friday. It would move them a point above Airdrieonians, albeit the Diamonds would have two games in hand.
With four fixtures remaining, County's survival chances appear slim.
They have won the fewest games in the division and lost the most; they are the joint lowest scorers and have conceded the greatest number of goals.
There is a small sliver of hope for the Staggies, based on the three previous meetings with Queen's Park this season. The away side has edged it each time and County really need to keep that sequence going.