LOCH Ness are facing an injury crisis with 12 players set to miss tomorrow’s North Caledonian Cup quarter-final at Golspie Sutherland.
But manager Shane Carling still believes he has enough players available to win the game and secure their place in the last four of the competition.
The match was originally scheduled to take place last weekend but was postponed due to extreme weather conditions.
Carling says facing the current league champions is a big task, even with a full squad.
But he says that due to the strength at depth in Loch Ness he thinks his side have every chance of winning tomorrow afternoon at Sutherland.
“I think boys can do it,” Carling says.
“Our team is quite good, even when we are missing a lot of boys like we are doing this weekend.
“This is probably our worst weekend yet for players who are unavailable as we will have at least 12.
“I have five boys injured, two players with Covid, one for personal reasons and players working off stranded because no flights are available due to weather.
“I have a goalkeeper on loan for the game this weekend.
“But that’s how it is and that’s football.
“We want to play every week and we have a big enough squad to play the game.”
Meanwhile, Loch Ness lead the North Caledonian League, seven points ahead of second-placed Invergordon with five games to play.
Invergordon are realistically the only team that can prevent Loch Ness from winning their first league title and Carling are taking nothing for granted.
“If we want to win the league, I don’t think we can afford to drop any more points. We have Halkirk, Invergordon, St Duthus and Alness twice.
“It’s a tough race to win the league.”