Raith Rovers have requested a weekend postponement after being hit with a coronavirus outbreak.

The Scottish Championship side are struggling to field a team against Inverness on Saturday.

The development came three days after Scottish football was suspended for three weeks below Championship level as part of measures to slow the spread of Covid-19.

A statement from the Kirkcaldy side read: “The club is currently dealing with an outbreak of Covid-19 amongst the playing and backroom staff.

“We have applied to the SPFL for postponement of this Saturday’s match v Inverness Caledonian Thistle, and are awaiting a response.

“In the meantime, we are co-operating fully with the appropriate authorities.”

The move came just ahead of Kilmarnock and St Mirren’s appeals against their sanctions for being unable to fulfil fixtures in October.

Both sides could not muster teams to face Motherwell because of coronavirus outbreaks and St Mirren also failed to face Hamilton.

The Scottish Professional Football League handed their opponents 3-0 victories on each occasion and the final outcome will now be decided by an independent appeal panel convened by the Scottish Football Association.

The SPFL declared that both clubs had admitted failing to implement the necessary physical distancing on coaches and during pre-match meals.

Saints were also found to have failed to provide suitable changing facilities to allow distancing while accepting that players had been car-sharing on training days.

Speaking ahead of the hearing, Killie boss Alex Dyer said: “The club has done the best it can and hopefully the right verdict will come through.

“It is a big call but it shouldn’t be. Like I said, we really haven’t done anything wrong.

“You can see what is happening in this country, down south – the pandemic is there and it’s real.

“To take points away from us for something that we can’t control, for all the protocols you put in, people are still being affected by it.

“It doesn’t make sense that they take points away from us or give the other team points.”

St Mirren boss Jim Goodwin added: “We just have to be patient and hope for the best, that’s all we can do.”

Meanwhile, Hearts boss Robbie Neilson expects fellow Championship clubs to be able to test players for Covid-19 for the rest of the season to allow it to be completed.

Hearts have been testing their players from last summer but other second-tier clubs were not obliged to unless playing Premiership clubs in cup competitions.

However, a requirement for weekly testing was made on Monday when the Championship was given the green light to carry on.

Neilson said: “Every (Championship) club got the £500,000 grant. To test from now until the end of the season for 30-40 players will cost you probably about £40,000.

“That’s less than 10 per cent of the grant that was put in place to assist clubs through this period. So I would expect that money to be used for what it was provided for, which is to see out the rest of the season.”