Match Preview: Cowdenbeath v Ross County

By far and away the biggest match of the season so far takes place at Central Park this Tuesday (kick off 7.45pm) as 9th placed Cowden take on 8th placed Ross County. 

With 4 points between the 2 sides this match could well prove critical in boths sides quest to avoid the play-off spot. Victory for the Blue Brazil could lead to the momentum heading to us while a defeat would be a dent in our ambition of staying up automatically.

Jimmy Nicholl will be missing Joe Mbu who is out for weeks after knee surgery and is also likely to have to do without John Armstrong, Bob Malcolm and Colin Cameron again. However, Greg Stewart is expected to come back into contention after missing Saturday's derby against Dunfermline Athletic due to work commitments.

The 3rd match between the 2 sides this season see's Cowden aiming for their first victory over the Dingwall side this season. On the opening day of the season we fell to a 2-0 defeat through goals from Di Giacomo and Gardyne. In 2011 we managed to fight to a 1-1 draw thanks to an own goal from Fitzpatrick to end our run of not scoring which had lasted 5 games. Our overall record against Ross County is not impressive to say the least - 1 win out of 29 does - but now is a good time to start to reverse this trend.

However our recent form on this day has actually been rather good - in 2008 we fought to a 1-1 draw against Alloa with Paul McQuade scoring our only goal. 5 years earlier we had narrowly defeated Brechin at home thanks to a penalty from our penalty king Iain Mauchlen. However we did have a rather soul-destroying 6-1 loss away to Dumbarton in 1999 with Graeme Brown scoring our only goal in a rather one-sided encounter.

Form going into the game could prove to be crucial and County are boosted by a win over bottom side Stirling Albion last weekend.  We come into the game on the back of a narrow derby defeat which despite not having the outcome any Cowden fans were looking for there were some signs of hope. It has been a long time since we won at home (6th of November!) so it is important for Cowden to get back to winning ways at Central Park and secure 3 vital points.

Match of the day fact of the week:- Our opponents have failed to score in 15 league games this season!  This is only bettered by St Johnstone (17) and tied with Hamilton who have played extra games