How fixing shower heads helped Inverness Caley Jags to league glory

TL;DR

Inverness Caledonian Thistle recovered from financial crisis to become League One champions, thanks to £1m funding from owner Alan Savage. Simple improvements, like fixing shower heads, played a key role in the turnaround.

Key points

Inverness Caledonian Thistle faced a financial crisis.
The club was placed into administration in October 2024.
Alan Savage injected £1m to help the club recover.
Simple improvements were made to boost morale.
Inverness secured promotion to the Championship.

Mentioned in this story

Alan Savage

Inverness Caledonian Thistle

The owner of Inverness Caledonian Thistle says sorting out "simple things" helped the club recover from a financial crisis to becoming League One champions.

ICT was placed into administration in October 2024 after running up millions of pounds in debts.

Businessman Alan Savage stepped in with an initial injection of £1m of funding, and the club exited administration in September last year.

Recalling the actions taken to achieve that, Savage said: "It was about reassuring the staff, fixing things like shower heads, simple things that had gone wrong."

Inverness secured promotion to the Championship with a 2-1 win over Hamilton Academical on Saturday.

Savage told BBC Radio Scotland's Breakfast programme that administration had been the best way to "clean up" the club's debts.

"They were in a mess," he said.

"A few initiatives had gone south and I think it was looking like the club would be liquidated.

"They needed an injection of cash to pull it out of that and that is when I got involved."

Alan Savage is sitting in the boardroom at Inverness Caledonian Thistle's stadium. He is an older man with white hair and clean shaven. He is wearing a black suit jacket over a white shirt.

Q&A

What financial crisis did Inverness Caledonian Thistle face?

Inverness Caledonian Thistle was placed into administration in October 2024 due to millions of pounds in debts.

Who provided funding to help Inverness Caledonian Thistle recover?

Businessman Alan Savage provided an initial £1m of funding to help the club exit administration.

How did simple improvements contribute to Inverness's success?

The club's owner mentioned that addressing simple issues, like fixing shower heads, helped reassure staff and contributed to their recovery and eventual championship win.