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pernickety - placing too much emphasis on trivial or minor details; fussy. synonyms: fussy, difficult to please, difficult, finicky, over-fastidious, fastidious, over-particular, particular, faddish, finical, dainty, punctilious, hair-splitting, exacting, demanding, critical, overcritical;

Looks like were gonna need a bigger boat.

No big fish though

No one is talking for putting the long term aims of the club in jeopardy. I don't agree with overspending either but if it cost the club £1,000,000 when it was relegated then if its possible to invest an additional something to keep it afloat then surely you would rather invest 5-10% of that potential loss in the team knowing full well that an additional two places in the league would recoup the money anyway. Nothing wrong with taking prudent precautionary measures, which is exactly what the club is doing as the gaffer is talking of bringing a couple of extra players in. Not directed at you but we often hear of us constantly punching above our weight, well what about Motherwell and their success or their players McFadden or Pearson as an example. We aren't far away from finding our own gems with the quality of football vastly improving at a junior level in the area. Hamilton v Motherwell Derby only had 3526 attendees. We are no longer the wee highland club that has come to visit the top flight for a novelty experience, it's now our home and it's up to everyone to pull together and secure the clubs future.

If the team wasn't sitting bottom of the league I'm positive there wouldn't be the same furore surrounding the performance of the board. It's very easy to argue that over a 4 year period where we managed successive top 6 finishes, two cup finals, one Scottish Cup win and European qualification we were really punching above our weight in terms of club infrastructure, fan base, budget etc etc. Surely this comes down to good work on both management and board sides. Terry Butcher had a very good model for player recruitment and left behind an excellent core for Yogi. Now obviously we consistently suffered from losing players due to contracts running down and therefore not being able to maximise revenue from that. Partly the board has to take responsibility in terms of contract length and structure but often it's down to the players not wanting to talk, or the manager wanting players to earn new contracts, which in itself produces good performances which attracts interest. Over the last 12 months several players have been signed on or rewarded with new longer deals. But now the players aren't really performing, so their value isn't maximised. So the board, have moved to rectify one issue (with what I'm sure would be approved and encouraged by the manager) and in doing so have possibly created a different issue. They can't really win. I'm under no illusions that last season showed that we are very much a team in transition now. I said as much at the time. We've lost a sizeable amount of key players (Shinnie, Mckay, Watkins for starters), others will leave this summer and others are probably needing to move on anyway. Frankly it shows what a good job Terry Butcher and his team were able to do season on season with player recruitment after losing Hayes, Rooney etc. They're boldness in moving players like Munro and Tokely on, both unpopular moves at the time but allowed us to move upwards. I think there does need to be a sense of realism around the club. We will peak and trough. Ebb and flow. Our size and budgetary confinement dictate that. Even big clubs struggle to replace a golden generation of players. The vast majority of match day revenue I'm sure goes towards game running costs and club costs. Wages etc. There will be very little left after day to day expenses. Whether the club are able to maximise merch and sponsorship revenue any more is a different question but one I do not know the answer to. Considering the league body went over a year without a sponsor shows that in general marketing within the Scottish game isn't that easy and I suspect it's hard to get a big deal for a club with a fan base of 3000. That's small fry to most advertisers. They also probably don't really see us as a crowd puller in terms of TV viewing so that has an impact also. Sky used to put out some embarrassing viewing figures for Scottish games when they had the most live coverage, some involving us. Sponsors see that. So are the board perfect, no. But I don't think they've done a terrible job. I'm sure other businessmen could do better. But they're not forming an orderly queue. And it stands to reason they're probably looking at bigger things than ICT. Is the manager doing a great job? No. Let's be honest. We're bottom of the league and his selection is sometimes questionable, however I think he's working hard to turn things around and he's been very unfortunate with injuries in a small squad and questionable decisions haven't helped. He's new to management and needs help. Are the players doing their bit? Some are, some have been poor. But that's not surprising when you're bottom. Confidence will not be high. That too has an impact. It will take a bit of magic or luck to change that along with hard graft. Are all players willing to do that?Remains to be seen. What can the fans do? Continue to attend, buy merch, play lottery etc. Club needs the money more than ever. Get behind the team. For a small community club we can be incredibly hostile at times. Stop looking for people to blame. Unless you have a solution. It doesn't help.

Worst riot I saw in HL football was at Borough Briggs, 1980 Q-Cup final, Buckie v .... The Jeggies. In fact, the second worst incident in my time also involved the Jeggies, v Elgin at Forres for some cup final in the early 90s. Madchester era. So, who were the real hoodlums in Sneck football?

Put-down comments are not boden well for his future. So maybe he just needs ....a GAME?

Away in a manager.

Yep, I liked his attitude against County, he didn't get enough time to do much, but he looked keen.

I think that he does get credit and he deserves to. There is no denying his success. However, there is equally no denying that his place in club history was tarnished by the self serving manner in which he engineered his lucrative self serving exit.

The back five have looked suspect all season and this has been our downfall to date. Unfortunately due to injuries etc they are guaranteed a start every week no matter how badly they perform, We have to bring in at least another central defender and full back. Also what is the story with Esson is he fit or not, because on present form Fon Williams deserves a rest.

Unfortunately our record in recent times against Patrick Thistle is pretty dismal!

It's hard to argue that he's doing a good job at the moment when the same tactical limitations seem to be on show every week, but it's far too early to know whether or not he has the managerial attributes to change that. A few weeks away from competitive games, a bit of a rethink, possibly a slight reshuffle in personnel (although we'll be pretty limited in what we can do in this respect, I guess) and maybe we'll see an upturn in results and performances after the break. Ultimately the board will make the decision about whether they think it's worth the sacrifice of paying him off in the hope that it will save the club from relegation, but personally I think it would be pretty unjust to profess belief in an untried manager and then write him off as a failure after six months in charge.

It's a good point - any of the bottom 7 would have a match on their hands against any of the current top 4 in the Championship. Just goes to show how competitive an extended premiership could be! I'm not that worried yet. Many of the past 10 years have seen at least one club cut adrift by now, I don't see that happening at any stage this season. Just need a couple of wins on the bounce and you're in the top 6 - we do have the ability to do that.

couldn't see this signing making the first team coming from amateur football in the republic. If anything i would take a gamble on a established player here in the north. The Northern irish league is part time but it has produced some fantastic players Niall Mcginn who came from dungannon swifts and Liam Boyce who we all know too well came from Cliftionville. That's just to name 2 there are many more. At the moment the league's top scorer is Andrew Mitchell of Dungannon swifts with so far about 18 goals in 24 games. Our standard of football would be the equal of Scotland league 2 or at the very best teams league one

I would suggest once (1999).... arguably twice (2008). I am pleased to see an element of sanity appearing in this thread through reminders of how marginal an event the survival up here of a football club in the top league, standing on its own two feet, actually is. I do realise that it's a bit late to be evoking Festive analogies, but Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" appeals. "The Ghosts Of Seasons Past" - epitomised perhaps by the Distillery End enclosure and the Kingsmills Pie Shed - could be usefully remembered by those who can and asked about by those who can't. "The Ghost Of Seasons Future" will always be shrouded in a veil of uncertainty until the very last moment.

This is my next game over. We better not fecking lose it!

Dean ebbe who the fcuk is that bluebells utd must b a made a made up team

Really Vigurs 3 seems pretty harsh, especially when you tell me that Tansey was twice as good as him with a six. This is the same Tansey who was caught in possession for the 3rd goal and generally overhit all the corners he took on Saurday thereby wasting any opportunity to put County under pressure.

12th man, you were perhaps being a bit too selective when you chose only to quote the words "Yogi with a team that reached Europe and won the Scottish Cup, was a result of the quality of the players he recruited " whereas if you had instead chosen to extend your quote to the entire sentence "It has become increasingly apparent that much of the success of the Butcher era, which had enough momentum to provide Yogi with a team that reached Europe and won the Scottish Cup, was a result of the quality of the players he recruited" a different interpretation may have emerged. Now I do agree that there would have been no scope at all for ambiguity at all if I had said "the players which Butcher recruited" or "the players which he (Butcher) recruited" . In hindsight that would have been a better way of putting it since the last named person before the "he" is indeed "Yogi" rather than "Butcher". But, given that "Yogi" is in a separate clause interpolated into the statement linking "Butcher" and "he", and that the full sentence doesn't seem as ambiguous as the part of it you selected.... I maybe just got away with it! So to avoid any ambiguity - in my view, much of the success at ICT of John Hughes, whose own signings were less than impressive, originated from players recruited by Terry Butcher.