Raith winger Grant Anderson reckons the underdog tag will suit Rovers just fine after they were handed a tricky away trip to Inverness in the Scottish Cup quarter-finals.
The Kirkcaldy’s club reward for knocking out Rangers on Sunday was a jaunt up the A9 for a very awkward looking tie against Premiership opposition.
But although Anderson admitted it perhaps was not the most glamorous of last eight games they could have been given, the Raith man maintains his side will still fancy their chances of causing another upset.
“Obviously it’s maybe not the most desirable tie, going away up there, but we’ve got to look at it as a winnable tie,” he commented.
“We’ve got to go up there with confidence, and it could have been worse.
“I don’t know whether us being underdogs calms the boys down or whatever.
“When you are underdogs you are not expected to do anything, and when you do it’s seen as a big scalp.
“But we’ve done well in the past going away from home, especially in the Scottish Cup last season when we went to Hibs and beat them, and then Rangers on Sunday.
“We’re one game away from a semi-final and playing at Hampden, so it’s a big incentive for us to go up there and do our best.
“Last season we got to the quarter-finals and got put out by the eventual winners.
“This season again we’ve got to the quarter-finals and we’ve got a great chance of getting to a semi, so we’re getting a bit of consistency.
“We won the Ramsdens Cup as well so we’re coming out as being a bit of a cup team to be honest.
“We’ve done brilliantly in the cup and kind of plodding along in the league, so we’ll hopefully keep it steady.”
Regardless of the opposition, Rovers are now just 90 minutes away from reaching a cup semi-final at Hampden and Anderson admits it would be a dream come true.
“It would be incredible to get to Hampden with Raith Rovers,” he continued.
“I was just thinking five or six years ago I was playing junior football, so to run out at Hampden in a major cup semi-final would be incredible.
“It would be the highlight of my career as well.
“I’ve only ever played at Hampden once and that was against Queen’s Park when I was at Hamilton.
“It was completely different circumstances, so it would be incredible to get there with Raith in the Scottish Cup.
“I think there were only a couple of hundred fans there, and it was very echoey and there was a lot of open space.
“It was one of the first rounds of the Challenge Cup I think, and it was one of my first games.
“The pitch was cracking when I played on it before, so if the stadium is going to be anywhere near full if we got to Hampden then it would be great.
“It’s obviously a massive incentive to try and get there.
“With only three Premiership teams left, it’s wide, wide open.
“It’s there for the taking and it’s all about who is on their game on any given day.
“If we can get into the semi-final then we’ll only be one game away from a national final.”
Anderson revealed that the Rovers players had been inundated with messages of congratulations after their 2-1 win over Rangers on Sunday, and the winger thanked fans for their support.
“I got on the bus after the game and I had 76% on my phone battery, and by the time I got home it was dead,” he added.
“My phone was going mental.
“But you’ve got to enjoy the highs like that when it happens.
“It was great on Sunday night and it continued on until Monday morning, so we’ve enjoyed it.
“A lot of the focus was on Rangers, but that’s always going to happen.
“People will look at how Rangers played and stuff like that, but it’s not as if we stole it.
“We went out and played well, and there were a lot of good performances throughout our team.
“We beat them, and convincingly beat them, which is to our credit.
“It was always going to come across that way, people talking about how badly Rangers played, but anybody who watched it and spoke about it could see what really happened.
“The reaction we got when we won the Ramsdens Cup was incredible.
“The reception afterwards was brilliant, so if we were to win a major competition like the Scottish Cup it would be incredible.
“Raith got to the semi-final against Dundee United in 2010 and there were 7,000-odd people who went to Hampden that day.
“That’s incredible, and it proves that Raith are a well-supported club.
“If we managed to get to a semi-final or final, the fans would come out in their droves.”