For now we will have to wait a little longer before Dundee can claim their first ever league win at the Caledonian Stadium but we will not get an opportunity like we did on Saturday to banish this curse hanging over us.
Going into this match the fans were expecting a better performance than the defeat at home last week and even more so, three points.
The start of the game was not enthralling for either set of fans, which is the type of performance we have been used to watching the past few weeks. Caley had the better of the first half but they failed to test Scott Bain.
I will summarise the first half by quoting the official match report on the Dundee website:
The first half was so dreary that the supporters were reduced to polite applause to celebrate winning throw-ins.
The second half was a much better improvement entertainment wise for the 2,940 fans in attendance. Only four minutes into the restart Dundee had a penalty and Caley were down to ten men!
Greg Stewart was put through on goal by a Nicky Low pass and even though he seemed to stumble over the ball, Caley defender David Raven clattered him from behind to send the number seven to the ground and himself down the tunnel for an early bath. Rory Loy coolly stepped up and slotted home his sixth goal in nine appearances to put him top of the Dundee goal-scoring chart.
From here on in, you would expect most teams to push on and kill the game with the man advantage. Unfortunately this has been a major problem for us this season and Caley would find themselves levelling the score from the penalty spot.
Kevin Holt was adjudged to have brought down Ryan Christie in the box and the resulting penalty was put away to make it 1-1. My view is that Christie went down very easily for the penalty and looking at the camera angles, I would question if there was even any contact between the players.
Basically, he dived.
Dundee put the pressure on Caley but there was no end product for all the possession and despite a few attempts, none really penetrated the defence and goalkeeper. Caley on the other hand had a fine chance to steal all the points but their player fluffed his shot, thankfully.
So the game ended in a draw to make it eight games in the Highlands without a win. If truth be told, I would have taken that before kick-off. One thing that has been well documented though is Dundee’s ability, or lack of, against ten men.
This is the fourth time this year we have played against ten men and every one of them have ended in a draw. More worryingly is that our last three draws in the league have all ended with this scenario! The Ross County game can be excluded because we were down to ten men but to be in the lead against Hamilton and Caley and to draw with the opposition a man short is nothing short of criminal. You can forgive the team if it happens once but not twice.
I did mention that this has happened four times this year and coincidently the first one happened also against Caley but at that time the score was 1-1 and with only minutes to go.
We are at a stage in the season now where I would say we need to pick up a good chunk of points before Christmas. At the top of the table we sit three points off fourth spot which is a brilliant position to be in but when you look down towards the teams propping up the league, we are only seven points away from a playoff spot and nine points from bottom of the table, Dundee United.
A few wins can see us siting comfortably in the top half of the table but a few defeats will see us sucked right into the bottom half. The fact that all the teams in this league have the ability to take points off each another shows just how close and tight the Scottish Premiership is at the moment.
