We are now safe in the SPL for next season, and about to be joined by the caravan dwellers. Given we dont know who we will have to make us spark next season, or Hibs or even HMRC newco, Where do you think we will end up compared to C*unty next season.

I just wonder if it will be a Hibs County relegation battle, or will more be involved at the wrong end. Could be the most boring SPL ever, with a clear favorite for the title and relegation all season long.

County probably have a better team than ICT just now. While they are going to lose Gardyne, they'll bring a few good players in. I expect them to be a difficult team to beat next season and could well finish above ICT.

I don't see Hibs battling relegation next season. In the SPL just now the only team I can see near the bottom are St. Mirren, all the rest should be fine. The team that comes up also normally stay up in their first season and County seem to be better this season than Dunfermline were when they won it.

So even though I see County staying up the only teams I can realistically see as possible relegation candidates are us, County and St. Mirren. I would probably say at the moment that we would be favourites for relegation. All depends on what team we have for next season. No Hayes and another rake of loan players and next season won't be a good one.

Why Hibs County relegation battle? It can just as easily be us or St Mirren or St Johnstone or any of the others outside the OF.

County will probably be ok, two things they will bring with them into the league is an abundance of self belief and confidence. It gave the Pars a boost when they first arrived too.

Any club could go down tbh, at the start of the season I didnt think the Pars would be where they are, I didnt think that Hibs would only be slightly better than them, I didnt think that Killy would win a cup, I didnt think Rangers would go bust and I didnt think that you would have needed 49 points to get into the top six this year.

As a wild card its possible that Dundee get relegated.

They havent been promoted yet - there is still time for the biggest collapse in Scottish history - Lets just be glad that it is'nt Hellgin Shittee at the top of the SFL.

C*unty have something like 12 first team squad players out of contract at the end of the season, so we are no more likely to know what their squad will look like than we are our own.

this is what I posted on P&B

We went up a couple of years ago and kept largely the same squad as previously. In the summer between promotion and resuming in the SPL we signed Johnny Tuffey, Kenny Gillet, Stuart Duff and Chris Innes. We also loaned in Kevin McCann. The only player who made significant appearences for us that season who was brought in during the close season was Duff, who mainly covered right back. The other four only made 30 odd appearences between them.

We had a mix of players who were young and showed they could make the step up to the SPL (Lee Cox, Adam Rooney, Jonny Hayes) and players who were experienced in the SPL (Ryan Esson, Grant Munro, Ross Tokely, Richie Foran). If you have that coming up then you don't need to add too much experience I think.

I don't think that Dunfermline, who now look odds on to go down although it's far from settled, have enough quality and that's why they've struggled. Certainly when I've seen us play them they are kind of like a watered down version of the 10/11 Caley team, mixing experienced and younger players but without the talent that we had.

Looking at County's squad they obviously have experience in there, most obviously in Grant Munro who has played six seasons in the SPL. One thing about the players who have taken them into the SPL is that several of them have previously played in the SPL and been found wanting - Richard Brittain had a big reputation at Livingston but didn't really impress with St Mirren, Scott Morrison didn't do much with Dunfermline and their leading scorer is Colin McMenamin who hasn't scored in the SPL or an equivelent level for many years. Of course that's not to say that they aren't good enough to do a job in SPL - some players 'fit' at a club before they perform and, of course, playing in a settled unit with a winning mentality will help. Losing Gardyne is a blow and Derek Adams will need to look for a creative player in the summer.

As pointed out above, there will probably be a big change in their squad and the teams they will be competing with so it's difficult to make any prediction.

I don't think county are a strong as the team that we brought up. They've ground out results whereas we were free scoring with foran scored more in the league than mcmenimen has this season and Rooney got almost double as

Much as mcmenimen has this season.

The loss of gardyne will be huge for them aswell they will have to try hold on to their back line and be a strong defensive unit in the spl. If they could get a proven goal scorer at spl level I could see Them challenging us for 6th, 7th, or 8th place next season.

The spl will make or break county next season Derek Adams has a big job in his hands the first 2 seasons are always the hardest. They have a team of players hungry to play spl football and I hope they do well because it could be the catalyst for highland football to expand with us pushing county an them pushing us. next season could be an exiting one.

Edited April 9, 201213 yr by lukemackay

I think if County can keep the majority of their current first team they'll do ok in first season up. Adams has experienced playing in SPL and probably learned a fair bit in his short spell at Hibs as asistant. Most of the players have SPL experience and are at the right age. 24 - 28.

Going on this seasons stats its very hard to predict what will happen next season.

Much will depend on who leaves and who stays and who gets brought in. I'm not going to guess that. Much will depend on how injuries impact on a team and whether the clubs can field a consistent side. But if County can keep their team largely intact and bring in 2 or 3 experienced players then they are likely to be hard to beat. Personally I don't see them going down and we will do well to finish above them

Much as it pains me to say it, I can see County ending up in the top 6 next season. So whilst we have been consistently above them since we joined the Scottish League they currently pip us in having reached a Scottish Cup final and next year they could beat our best ever league position as well. Normal service will then resume after that.

One more prediction. We release Proctor, he joins Munro across the bridge and has a superb season.

I'll stop now before I get too depressed.

No matter what you think of the pegsellers you have to congratulate them on what is an amazing achievement

For a diddy non league outfit and that's what they were to reach the top flight really is a huge kick in the teeth to the pro merger roasters within our club who try to tell everyone that without a merger Caledonian Fc would not have achieved the same as ICT

Let's not forget they will be the first ever Highland league outfit to have reached the top tier in Scottish football, remember they also reached the Scottish cup final only two years ago and took 17,000 fans with them to Hampden

I do think one day we could possibly reach a major cup final in the coming years but I know we could not take as many fans, possibly 10,000 at a push but that would still be decent considering our average attendances since joining the SPL

The set up through in Dingwall with the Academy and pitches is really second to none and there can't be many clubs in Scotland that can boast of such facilities

The fact we train at an army barracks is still a major gripe for me and is totally unsuitable and not acceptable for a SPL club

Once they complete their stadium improvements over the summer this will only enhance what they already have in place

As far as i'm aware they were never given any grants or council hand outs like we were when we moved to our so called dream home at the dump which makes their set up all the more remarkable

County obviously have a board and chairman who really know what they are doing and prefer action to words

I personally can't wait for next season mainly due to the return of the highland derbies but I must add I'm also a tad scared that if we are not careful we will be left behind on and off the field

Dougal

First off Dougal, the academy does not belong to RC

Second, whats wrong with training at Fort George?

Dunde U dont have fancy training facilities, they use council parks. I believe Hearts use Heriot Watt Uni.

Many of Counties 17000 fans were neutrals looking to see history being made. How many did we take to Hampden for our semi?

St Johnstone train on a field just outside falkirk

and yes hearts do use herriot watt for training

First off Dougal, the academy does not belong to RC

Second, whats wrong with training at Fort George?

Dunde U dont have fancy training facilities, they use council parks. I believe Hearts use Heriot Watt Uni.

Many of Counties 17000 fans were neutrals looking to see history being made. How many did we take to Hampden for our semi?

It doesn't matter one hoot who owns or part owns the football academy, the fact is it's situated in Dingwall adjoining Victoria park

Now County are in the SPL they will attract the better players as they have the better facilities on their doorstep can you imagine the embarrassment If Terry tried to attract new players to ICT by taking them through to see the facilities at their highland rivals

This obviously does not happen and this is why we continually get these loanees or untried diddies from England, yes there's been one or two successes but most are sadly pish

Fort George pitches are of poor quality in my opinion and the fact that we have to train away from Inverness is a far from ideal

situation

We took less than 7000 to the semi if I remember correctly so I final would not attract many more although neutrals might push it over the 10,000 mark

Football forums are all about different opinions but you keep on happy clapping at least your consistent

Dougal

You make a lot of good points here Dougal, i agree with pretty much everything you have said on this matter.

all you need to play football is grass, a ball, and 4 jumpers who needs fancy training facilities we use fort george 99% of the time and when we cant because of rain or snow we have the option of using millburn academys 3g pitch or charleston. theres no problem with that.

there were 17000 thousand 'fans' for the final but the semi final there was 24 thousand fans overall and id put money on at least 17 thousand of them being celtic supporters. so they had no more for their semi final than we did in ours if we got to the final theres no doubt in my mind we would be able to take the same amount of fans.

whenever county come up on here dougal you always seem to look at what theyve done and see it as somehow better than what we have done well we reached the spl in 10 years its taken them 83 years, and theyve been past the last 16 of the scotish cup on 1 occasion. the only competition theyve done better than us in is the alba cup wining it twice and theyve had 18 attempts at it and we only had 11. technically theyve done better than us in the 2nd divison but only because they got relegated from the first division and had another chance to win it whereas we have never been relegated from a sfl division. need anymore?

Apologies to anyone who read a previous post by me in this slot which I have now deleted since - given the massive success of the project over a period of almost 20 years now - I really have to discipline myself not to argue the bleeding obvious with any of very fewer anti merger whingers who still have their AGM in a phone box in Telford Street.

Edited April 9, 201213 yr by Charles Bannerman

It is going to be an interesting Summer imo.

I am surprised no-one has tipped Aberdeen for Relegation next season though or put them down as candidates for Relegation.

For us not to be among those contenders for the drop, we need to think about Strengthening our Strike force, 1 out and out Goalscorer wouldn't go amiss and there will be ones available in the Summer.

I always find it rather amusing when some fans claim reaching the SPL in ten years is some kind of major achievement

Ok it's gone to plan but in my opinion top tier acceptance should have happened even quicker due to the various helping hands ICT have had from day one

There can't be many if any clubs who started out who received substantial monetary handouts like ICT did from from INE and the council

ICT stripped the assets of two former clubs and should have inherited the supports of both clubs however this sadly backfired and this remains a major problem nearly twenty years on

My problem is stagnation, the way I see it is there are certain people within the club and I include supporters in this who show little or no ambition, they already see SPL status as the ultimate goal and as long as they remain in the bottom six they are happy

Whether we like it or not County are a far more forward and ambitious club and their achievements so far outweighs us, Mahonio is right in stating this summer is going to be very interesting to see what new players are going to arrive at both clubs

It could be argued that both clubs will be losing their best players(Gardyne and Hayes) but I would guess they already have a replacement in mind whereas Butcher will still be scouring the Conference in England for yet another loanee

Should this groundshare come into fruition im definitely going to watch both sides to begin with and I may even pop through to Dingwall to check out their new stadium when it opens just to see how much better it will be than the dump

As for Bannerman instead of apologising for one deleted post he should maybe apologise for the other 2250 that still remain an eyesore on this site

Dougal

Just a shame you remain so bitter about the merger, Dougal, because if you took the venom surrounding that issue out of your posts on this thread then you'd have a few things left that I would agree on.

That's not to say I disagree with your merger related issues, I just don't see the point in constantly dragging them up and they only serve to give people an excuse to ignore the other stuff in there which is worthy of discussion.

I always find it rather amusing when some fans claim reaching the SPL in ten years is some kind of major achievement

supporters in this who show little or no ambition, they already see SPL status as the ultimate goal and as long as they remain in the bottom six they are happy

So what based on our size of club should be the ambition? Eclipsing the record of 9 in a row, Champions League dominance, Domestic trebles back to back? Perhaps the rest of the fans are realists? SPL survival, cup runs - perhaps even finals and maintaing a finacially stable organisation that should be the aim not just now but for the future too.

Regardless if the club is.was IC or IT do you honestly believe a non-mergered club would have done any better than ICT have? The fans that dont want to get behind the team evern after all this time as IMO being narrow minded and not looking at the bigger picture.

As I suspected all along - Dougal is in the same mould as Mr Bannerman - a Tink at heart - O2B.

The only Tinkerville game that I would ever go to that does not involve ICT will be the game near the close of the 2012 - 2013 season that involves the Tinks being relegated.

Lots of people are engaged in hanky clutching, tear flecked breakdowns on this forum about County coming up. We spent years in the same league as County and finished above them just about every season, attracted far better players than they did and won twice as many derbies. This was despite them spending a great deal of money for many years.

I don't buy the argument that them being in the league will mean we are competing for players with them. We are just as likely to compete for playes with other SPL sides, St Johnstone, St Mirren and the likes. The scope of the transfer market for clubs like us and County has expanded into England and connections are more important than simply trying to buy up Scottish players in the way that happened in the past.

Edited April 10, 201213 yr by ictchris

Regardless if the club is.was IC or IT do you honestly believe a non-mergered club would have done any better than ICT have?

I don't see why not.

It wouldn't have taken long for people in Inverness to see the benefit of the town having a senior football team. Money that was directed at ICT could just as well have been directed at any Inverness team.

And without the merger baggage, whichever Inverness team decided to go it alone, could have hit the ground running and perhaps made even quicker progress than ICT.

But it's all academic now, although it's always interesting to imagine what might have happened. And I do get a bit tired of reading that "it couldn't have happened without the merger."

Of course it could - look at Ross County!

As I suspected all along - Dougal is in the same mould as Mr Bannerman - a Tink at heart - O2B.

The only Tinkerville game that I would ever go to that does not involve ICT will be the game near the close of the 2012 - 2013 season that involves the Tinks being relegated.

Oh the irony you are accusing me of being a county supporter yet you are the tattoo ridden,tricolour flying rebel singing plastic paddy who frequented the jungle more than the howden end but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong

I admit I do admire County and what they have achieved so far I think I'm probably even jealous but accusing me to be in the same mould as Bannerman is way below the belt

ICT have stagnated, a top six should have been achieved by now, Terry and Mo have taken us as far as they can, we need fresh ideas and the club taken to the next level

I take CaleyD's point regarding the merger/murder and I won't bring it up again unless provoked but IMO it's up there with the darkest hours in Snecks history along with the massacre at culloden or when the hebriddean bar closed it's doors

One parting shot the Ender knows it and I know it the vast majority of howdenenders never embraced the new club from day one and even till this day they and their families/friends take nothing to do with ICT

Edit : well said Buckett

dougal

Edited April 10, 201213 yr by dougal