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There seems to be plenty of vehicles in the car park on a daily basis, presumably companies using the rooms for conferences/meetings etc. Either that or all our midfielders turning up for training on the same day.

That's nothing! Ross County can bring 150% of the population of Dingwall to a Cup Final!

There are sixteen or seventeen teams capable of competing in top flight. As performances go just now all bar four are very much a match for each other. Everyone of those teams can take points from and lose points to every other and from time to time take points from the top four. We're all in the same boat so surviving in top league has to be the main aim with anything higher being a bonus

It's disappointing not to make top six, especially after coming so close, but it's not the first time - I'm sure we've missed out on top six on goal difference before now. Personally I think that provided we can finish these last few games strongly then the team have done No Bad considering all the injuries this season. Some people say you can't use that as an excuse, but I don't see why not as it has affected team selection all season. I wonder if the board could do with being a little more transparent with the clubs finances. It's great to support a club who are not in debt and not to be worrying about the threat of administration all the time, but it's also galling to watch other clubs come in and pick off our players. They don't all have big turn outs at games so why can they afford what we can't. Maybe if we could understand a bit more about what comes in and what goes out, we would understand the decision making better. At Christmas time I was diagnosed with a potentially life threatening illness and have been receiving various forms of treatment since then. I'm doing well and hope that things will turn out alright in the end but I have found that the only time that I forget completely about my ill health is on a Saturday afternoon (or Sunday lunchtime or Tuesday evening depending on TV schedules) when I'm watching Caley Thistle play. It doesn't seem to matter if the game is good, bad or just plain ugly, it has the ability to take my mind off every thing else for a couple of hours and I have been grateful for that. At the end of the day, it is just a game and I would hate for the pressure on our players to affect their lives with their families away from the football pitch. I like to think they enjoy being in Inverness for all the things that life has to offer them away from football up here as well as at the club. Life is too short and none of us know what's waiting around the corner. In the worst case scenario, where the team would end up relegated, upsetting as it would be, it wouldn't be the end of the world. They'd still be our team and we'd still support them and to tell the truth I quite enjoyed the season we spent after we were relegated - no ugly sisters, refs seemed fairer and less likely to cave under pressure from fans and the league was tight and competitive, where each week seemed to involve lots of reshuffling of the table - football was fun again (although I'd still rather avoid it if possible this season). Onward and upward Inverness Caledonian Thistle Football Club on your amazing journey. I can't ever imagine supporting anyone else.

The fate of Caley Thistle from now on will be like the attraction of love-making --- it's an up-and-down process. And that's s why we unconditionally support the team through thick and thin 'cos we love 'em? eh?

Sat 16 Apr 2016 Danske Bank Premier C Allen (Cliftonville 0 - Glentoran 2) Dafabet Welsh Premier J Oswell (Hat trick) (Newtown 3 - Gap C Q 2) National League South B Greenhalgh (Hayes 2 - Concord R 2) Highland League C Dingwall (Strathspey 0 - Formantine 10) (Neil Gauld, NOT ex ICT, scored 8 goals!) M Laing (Inverurie 2 - Clach 3) S Leslie (Inverurie 2 - Clach 3) S Duff (Turriff 2 - Cove R 2) L MacKinnon (Buckie 5 - Rothes 0)

I agree totally SB, controlling variables is very difficult here. However I think one thing is quite clear about Scottish football. If Celtic and Rangers were "normal" football clubs as opposed to vehicles for factions which, over 400 years on, still basically haven't come to terms with the Reformation, the game here would have somewhat fewer attendees overall, much fewer at Ibrox and Celtic Park, but rather more at all other grounds..... as well as being far more interesting with a much more pleasant atmosphere in a lot of cases.

There's no point wanting to survive in a league you have no ambition to do anything in. We should be looking to be in the mix for top 6 each year and push on to Europe every so often, not just to survive. I understand that we can't have brilliant season every single year, but anybody who says they'd be happy with 10th year after year is kidding themselves on.

CaleyJagsTV footage added to report.

Not complaining about this season as I know it's unrealistic to expect what we got last season every year, but I don't get this mentality of wanting to just survive every year, surely there has to be a point where you need to be more ambitious? What's the point of surviving to survive? Or have I misread your post

And therein lies the nub of the entire issue - the manner in which the Old Firm distort not only any statistics relating to the game in Scotland but the actual game itself. Forget about Iceland and the Faroes. Their population is so small (and arguably there's nothing much else to do there apart from shooting seals and watching football) that statistics relating to them don't really have much meaning. It's therefore worth noting that the very biggest and the very smallest populations lie at opposite ends of that table. Uruguay is indeed interesting. It's the only country where the biggest two attendances are a bigger percentage of all football goers than Scotland's (55% compared with 50%). However Uruguay's population is 63% of Scotland's whereas the "top two" attendances (25,000 compared with 95,683) are only 26% of Scotland's. The difference is attributable to Uruguay's lower percentage of the country's population attending football (1.39% compared with 3.68%). A similar argument applies to every other "normal" sized country and the conclusion therefore has to be that by any means of measurement, Scotland's apparent (sic) standing is due to the massively disproportionate numbers attending Old Firm home games. Scotland's football attendances are therefore clearly strongly driven by the OF - but for completely the wrong reasons. In fact Sneckboy's table goes a long way to support my long held belief that what run Scottish football are not factors relating to football itself but more relating to the tribalism and sectarianism created by the religious and political divisions of West Central parts. It is the existence of these divisions which plays a huge part in pulling people into Ibrox and Celtic Park and to a large extent the football is somewhat secondary. One of the main drivers is the role which Rangers and Celtic play as vehicles for that politico-religious societal sickness which blights that part of Scotland. And then, once these two clubs reach critical masses for these non-football reasons, they also act as black holes which suck in all manner of glory hunters from everywhere else, leaving the rest of the Scottish game impoverished. Consequently, I doubt if there is a real football nation in the world where "support" is as polarised in the direction of just two clubs - for the right reasons, never mind the wrong ones as here - as it is in Scotland. On these grounds, to a large extent Scottish football is a distorted joke. Perhaps the most revealing statistics would be the percentages of a) the entire population and b) the football going population of each country who attend clubs OUTWITH the biggest two. I am quite sure that this would show the uphill struggle that Scotland's other clubs have in the face of these two artificially inflated refuges for societal strife. Sneckboy - are you up for another of your tables?

Can't believe what I'm reading here. Solid performance, clean sheet and a good point against a high flying Hearts. Every player put in a shift. Vigurs and Tremarco standouts for me. I think people are starting to carry over negativity from previous outings. Last night we did pretty well imo.

I'm aware of the book, but haven't got it! As soon as I read the OP, I immediately thought of Scotland as 2nd behind Albania - same as Kingsmills. I think it was a widely held assumption after a 'study' a few years ago. There have been numerous studies done over the years and Scottish attendances are some of the very best in Europe and the world. Regardless of the study, Scotland is always one of the top countries. Albania has slipped somewhat, however. Not even in the equation now. I can only assume the 'Albania' stat was from around 2011, when their domestic attendances were significantly better than now. It's virtually halved over 5 years since then, with an alarming year-on-year reduction. http://www.european-football-statistics.co.uk/attn.htm The website above is the favoured resource for stattos as it's usually spot-on with its accuracy, despite covering all of Europe. For ictfcsince94, this would be your best bet for comparing us to Real Madrid etc. An interesting statistic from here https://theballisround.co.uk/2012/06/12/the-most-passionate-football-nation-in-europe/ has Scotland at 4th in Europe, although, none are specifically for the past few seasons - but the trend is the same; folk in Scotland attend football at a pro-rata rate more than those of England, Germany etc... We're ranked just behind the Faroe Islands, Iceland and Cyprus, Another study concludes the same: except this time, we're above Cyprus, but still behind the Faroes and Iceland. The darkest colours again showing Cyprus, Scotland, Iceland and the Faroes as the top football supporting countries

2016-2017 and beyond ? Probably more of the same - the best feckin roller coaster ride in the world. You simply have to take the ups with the downs. CaleytillIdie