Livingston manager David Martindale is not surprised that County are in the play-off for a third successive season.
He believes that a 12-team top flight means it is likely to be the same clubs battling it out at the bottom to avoid the drop in most campaigns.
Most years, clubs like County, St Johnstone and his own are likely to be either fighting relegation from the top flight or chasing promotion from the Championship and “every year seems to get a wee bit more difficult”.
Cowie suggested Livingston have made “a little tweak in their style of play” this season and are “playing a lot of good football” in a recent run of six wins in seven outings.
Indeed, the West Lothian side prevailed 3-2 after extra-time when they met in a January Scottish Cup thriller in Dingwall.
Martindale, though, said Thursday’s visitors are “a club that’s done fantastically well over the years” considering the difficulty in attracting players and keeping them at Scotland’s most northerly club.
However, the 50-year-old admitted: “I’ve been looking at them probably since the Scottish Cup game up there, so I had one eye on them at that point.”
Before the victory over Thistle, Martindale admitted takeover talks meant there was doubt about whether he would be extending his five-year stint as team boss.
Calvin Ford, the great-great-grandson of Ford Motor Company founder Henry Ford, has since been announced as the club’s new majority shareholder and chairman.
However, Martindale said that, while there is “a belief” within his squad that they can win the play-off, all the pressure is on County as it is they who have their Premiership status on the line.
“I think all the apprehension, all the anxiety, should probably be with the team that was sitting 11th in the Premiership, because I think there’s a huge amount of pressure on them,” he added.
