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Hughes wasn't hounded out by fans, nor was Foran demanded by them. They accepted the decisions that were made, without being party to them, and hoped for the best. By Christmas they could see the potential disaster Had the board acted then, we might be comfortably mid table. The loyalty to Foran has been horribly misplaced and allowed him to get away with murder.

Richie Foran might have failed as first team manager, but to call him a fraud or a wage thief is harsh beyond belief. If the man is guilty of anything, it's accepting whatever contracts the club has offered him over the years (as a player, then manager). He can't be faulted for that. Your first loyalty is to your family - not your football club. If resigning means a financial sacrifice on his part, he'd be crazy to do so, and I don't blame him for holding on as long as possible. Ultimately he's just an employee doing a job to the best of his ability. If a new first team coach is required, it's up to his bosses to act - either cancel his contract and pay him every penny he's due, or negotiate and re-deploy him to a diminished but secure long term role (rather like Charlie Christie getting his Centenary Club job back). I thought the board was supposed to be full of business brains? If RIchie cannot be sacked for financial reasons, surely between them they can offer him a decent job worth 'walking away' for?

The point is that your bold claims about being some kind of soothsayer who foresaw this demise and rubbished claims of our new style of play at the time are simply garbage. I don't disagree that if Hughes was still in charge we probably wouldn't be on the cusp of being relegated however his time at the club was clearly at an end for reasons that have been discussed to death on this forum and he had to go. What he did with us was fantastic, taking a team we all thought was at its peak under Butcher and somehow got them playing even better. It was incredible. But after players started leaving, Hughes yet again showed his failings in the transfer market and couldn't replace those who left. Foran was clearly the cheap option but given the club have let Hughes spunk a mental amount of cash on the squad, gave him a new contract and then had to pay him off (and some allege are still paying him now), I am not sure what folk expected the club to do? That said I do think that the board should have acted back in January or whenever it was that we lost to Hamilton and, as much as I love Foran, sent him packing. It was clear by this point his tactical setups and team selections were questionable and we were already sliding down a very slippery slope. The fact is, blame can be apportioned on all parties here. Hughes for leaving a bloated, unbalanced squad in need of a serious overhaul with little cash for the incoming coach to work with, Foran for his largely poor signings, questionable selections and odd tactical setups and the board for sitting back and allowing this mess to develop.

Foran applied for the job fckin right he should be the scapegoat guys a clown get him out soon as this mare of a seasons over never win championship with him in charge

Hughes had us playing some pretty turgid football last season. Relegation was a possibility up until we found some form after the split, I think our run of results post split put a bit of a gloss on last season. Our inability to defend cross balls is something that we inherited from Hughes - even in the cup winning season the number of goals we lost from either crosses, or the second ball in after clearing a corner was frightening. Hughes inability to spot players was a weakness too - and just how many midfielders does one club need to sign? Having said all that, if Hughes wasn't the answer, Foran definitely isn't. All he has managed to do is polish the turd that Hughes left behind into a nice shiny relegation!

Yip and he wouldn't have got us to a Scottish Cup Final, won it and into the Europa League.

While this may be slightly off topic, if/when we get relegated, there is a chance to start afresh with many things next season. Getting back to a more "local or Scottish squad would help and I refuse to believe there are not some players in the Highland League who could step up albeit part time or full time. While I accept that fans may not turn out in the same numbers as this season, the club will really need supporters to back the team. Boycotting the team because RF/The Board haven't resigned next season will only hasten any demise. There is a 1 in 4 opportunity to get promotion either directly or via the play offs which wasn't their previously so better odds than previously to get promotion. All of this does come with a huge caveat however in that the board/manager must get their planning right in the summer and that is the part which worries me most.

Is it though? He like several players in our squad have picked up very generous salaries - if you consider Foran injured for 2 years and now failed managered, Doran out for 2 years and MacNaughton practically injured all year - now while some will say that nobody chooses to get injured - what have they done in the background. What did Foran do for his 2 years, he may have done some coaching badges but as the man earmarked to take over from Hughes where was his involvement in the coaching during this time, I accept Hughes left soon than expected by Foran should have been better prepared by this time and had more experience. For certain individuals we get poor levels of return IMO. Like the Foran situation the fault with all this lies with the board making poor choices and offering contracts either through desperation or sentiment.

I travelled to the Stirling game and the Cowdenbeath game pre-season and for me it was very worrying to watch. I turned to my Girlfriend and said "I think we are going to struggle this season." and boy was I understating that. I very much doubt Butcher returning would cause a magical return to the SPFL like when he first took charge. If Richie called it a day and left I think it would have to be a totally new manager not one of our previous ones. What concerns me more is what cif73 is saying, I dont want to see Caley Thistle die after only 23 years but thats another topic. (also my first post , please go easy. dinnae skelp me lol)

Could people read through the post 5-1 Tynecastle thread. Is it not condemning that nearly everything that was raised in that aftermath has come true ?!! And that was long before Xmas. To me the problem with Hughes was that a lot of the fans wanted entertainment as well as survival. The Board and Hughes were at daggers for months. I feel that he basically said that he could not take the club any further without extra financial resources. That totally frustrated him so he set up a system to survive. To be fair the board may not have had the resources to fuel his ambitions. After Butcher and Hughes I also feel that the Board opted for what they thought would be the easy option. I also feel that, like Foran, thay all thought that we would scrape through this season. If Foran was going to go he would have gone by now. The Board will stick by Foran now. He has admitted his greenness. The blame is and will be stuck on the players. It really is a sad,sad state of affairs.

I can understand that a lot of people are getting on my back, over Richie Foran. I seem to remember he was a popular choice on his appointment. What do I know, but lynching the manager is a popular remedy for failure. It can work look at Leicester City, But not Birmingham City. Managing a football club is not easy especially with no cash. Guys have left the club for pastures new , usually Aberdeen or Dundee because of one thing cash. Hughes left because he couldn't pay his players the going rate. Managing in a lower division , who can we attract ? I am not jumping on the sack the manager bandwagon . I realise it is just my opinion, but I am not convinced he ( Foran ) is incapable of managing with the proper resources. - Have another go at me chaps, I can't help the way I feel. As in the last line of " Gone With the Wind " Tomorrow is another day " We have nothing to lose in the next few games, let's blast the hell out of the opponents.

John Hughes is hardly setting the heather of fire at Raith. If he didn't like our budget previously I'm pretty sure he won't like next season's! Move on. His arrogance and greed screwed himself and the club.

I've got a feeling Terry and Mo will be the management team for next season. Can we forget whats happened in the past?

Sometimes you can tell a lot about a poster and to what level to consider or disregard their views by the standard of their writing and ahem...their profile photo.

Are you for real!!! I understand we're all hurting but this seems a bit personal tbh

Not a quitter hes a fraud picked up a wage and hardly kicked a ball for years! Relagation wasnt a possibility till he came in fcuk nos why people make excuses for him the worst manager in spl history surely

Welcome aboard Matthew. I don't think you are the only one concerned for sure

Are you on crystal meth bud forans the problem hes killing the club mans a clueless bullyboy

Travel club has organised buses as follows 17/5 Dundee pick up Caley Club 3.30pm, stadium 3.45pm 20/5 Kilmarnock pick up Caley Club 9.15am, stadium 9.30am pick ups at Aviemore and Broxden Book through CJT or ICT Supporters Travel Club Facebook sites or on 07951309504

This was one of my biggest bugbears with Foran. Good performances against Dundee and Saint Johnstone earlier int he season and later against Hearts and Rangers and instead of keeping that same approach to games he changed it and results faltered thereafter. I know you can't play the same way every single week and you need wee tweaks here and there but it seemed bizarre to have these good games and see players like Tansey coming to the fray after looking lost for weeks only to change the set up again and then the likes of Tansey went back to being completely ill effective. He never seemed to want to build on good results and changed things around again, results again became poor but then he strangely started to stick with defensive and narrow setups.

This is a problem that is going to affect all clubs with an average attendance under 5,000 who don't have a sugar daddy as costs rise against a stagnant support base. Scottish football is so poor that European qualification usually costs clubs money as they can't get through the preliminary rounds to the competition proper and can't recoup their costs due to the small supporter base St J being an example. Amongst the solutions would be part time football or hire more local talent at a cheaper cost which probably means playing in the lower leagues, smaller squad sizes, standing areas (at lower cost) and summer football might also help attendances. Clubs like Hamilton (who once had to resign from the league due to debt) have only survived because of their academy and the transfer fees and sell on fees they have collected which is definitely the way to go for smaller clubs to be able to compete. They also take a lot of their players from the lower Scottish leagues. When I started watching ICT we had a team of Scottish players now we have hardly any I also think the team we had in Div 1 was a better side than what we have now. There are far fewer people both playing and watching the game than there were back in the day, the standard has come way down and the cost way up. I recall a decent Partick side getting over 15,000 at home against Honved in the 70's despite getting knocked out with that crowd they would have made some money. They would be doing well to get half that today.

So here we are 4 days after an excruciating and catastrophic defeat that put all that went before it in the dark and Foran has still not had the courage to hold his hands up and resign. That would be the respectful thing to do - he might even leave with a morsel of respect, although maybe he's too late even for that. In the meantime, his employers have evaporated from the planet. Too scared or financially incapable of doing anything to save the club. So, Foran is really never going to resign or to be sacked. Every day, I wake up hoping that brave decisions might have been made. It seems I am as delusional as the club and management. Sad.

Ah but did the 3 goals all cross the line

I can remember almost every second poster on this forum wanting JH out and RF in, so KC gave them what they wanted, he sacked JH and appointed the cheaper and less demanding option RF and filmed pre season interviews in which we were told that the old boring style of play would be gone and a new exciting brand of play would have the fans off their seats. Of course it was all nonsense, I said so at the time and whilst KC didn't expect RF to win anything I doubt he expected the whole thing to blow up quite so spectacularly. That the ICT support could call for the sacking of the man who brought us the SC, a third place finish in the league and European football for the first time is beyond understanding. As Charlie Christie said last Friday "they should have erected a statue in his honour", yet some people will still not give JH the praise he deserves and still hoped against hope that their hero RF could turn things around when it was painfully obvious he was completely out of his depth with less than half the season gone. A famous financial commentator once said (I think it was Melken) that "the people deserve what they get and they deserve to get it good and hard" Pride comes before a fall right enough, perhaps those same supporters ludicrous expectations might cool down in the championship. For my own part, I have set my expectations quite low, I expect another relegation should the current board and RF remain in charge.

On the Fans ownership thread elsewhere I posted about the club's annual accounts. In that post It's clear that they are easy to find/download. We've accumulated well over £3m of losses since 1994 and the people who have invested almost £4m in shares are unlikely to see any of their £ again, not because they don't want the money back but because the vast majority of the money has gone over the years in keeping the club alive. It relies on windfalls like Christie. I'm not an insider, I'm just reading the publicly available accounts. Given we made a £1m loss in the year following the last relegation, we could be staring down the barrel of an insolvency event (and all that that entails) in the next one/two years unless the board are ruthless with spend or we get a significant benefactor ... and that's even if we keep fans / ST-holders coming along. Goodness knows it's hard viewing just now but, plain and straight, I truly believe that our decisions as supporters over the next few months will come down to whether we want to see our club die or not.

Some good points there in what is quite possibly the longest sentence in the history of the planet lol.

As would your good self!

Paul Hartley build two or three Alloa teams on a shoestring and when he left was only just outside the play-off promotion places (IIRC) which is no small feat for a part time team. He did get Dundee promoted but they were already doing well anyway and while he rebuilt their team once again, it could be argued he underachieved in the Premiership. I think the stuff about him refusing to move north was just an urban myth. He might not be the best candidate in the running should the job come up, but he'd certainly be better than the incumbent. That leads me onto another potential candidate. Seemingly when Hughes got the job, it was very much between him and not Paul Hartley, but Paul Telfer. Now he would be an intriguing candidate. A distinguished playing career all over Britain and was apparently manager in everything but name of Sutton United. He'd surely have contacts and knowledge of players all around the English lower leagues and that market has certainly served us well in the past. He's also coached in America and there could well be players around there that could interest us.

It's the benefit of hindsight. At the time I was delighted that the board had stood up and held on to a couple of prize assets. Eighteen months later and we've lost one for nothing and had to pay to get rid of the other, so it's not hard to see why people think we should have cashed in at the time.

Sad thing is County have also had an absolutely dreadful season and their fans have also being shouting for their manager duo to be sacked up until the last few weeks To get humped so badly in a derby with no fight no passion and no bad tackles tell me our players have already given up the ghost and knew relegation was already on the horizon Draper and McKay should have been the first two names on the starting line up, the dressing room is obviously in turmoil Also the so called young team, how many times do they need to be told to not let off smoke bombs? Whoever the moron was that threw one on when we were about to take the corner should be banned from ICT games for life let's be honest they have become an absolute embarrassment to this club the fact that some defend them because they create an atmosphere no longer cuts it with me If we do indeed go down let's hope they go and follow either sides of the old firm where their antics will be more welcome Dougal

MrMantis I agree with you Problem with Charlie is he could never cope with criticism either as a player or a manager and walking into this sort of situation, well the pressure and scrutiny he would be under would be intense and I doubt he could handle it I personally don't think his outburst to the press is touting for the managers job but more with what's going on financially behind the scenes Dougal

The problem is in the board who are a bunch of muppets! Kenny Cameron is David Sutherlands puppet! Until the board is displaced the club is doomed! It's been on the cards for a long time relegation. It's not forans fault it's the board for 1 giving him a big contract when he was long term injury and then putting him in as manager to justify his wages . It's a MESS.

The way Terry and Mo left us shouldn't be forgotten, there wasn't an ounce of dignity in the way they acted. I'm not saying people returning to their old jobs is a bad thing (in fact it can be a great boost!), but they completely sh@t on us and I dislike that. The fact Mo is back doesn't sit well with me.

At this present moment, 12 months compensation feels absolutely like a price worth paying for the long term benefit of the club.

I would attach far more weight and credence to what the likes of Charlie and Barry Wilson say than what is posted these days on the increasingly deluded and out of touch official Twitter account.

The problem with the club predates Foran's appointment by a number of years. Since Butcher left, we have been entirely incapable of replacing the class of players that have left. We should have let Hughes go speak to Dundee United and should have sold Tansey rather than letting him go for free. We should have probably held on to Billy McKay while he was in form, rather than letting our top goal scorer leave for a (in football terms at least) tiny fee. At a club of our size, that can not go on cup runs season after season, we really need to be making smart decisions regarding turning over players. Why are we so incapable of scouting? Football is a business and we really need to be buying cheaper players and selling them on later giving the club some form of income to re-invest in young talent. Yes, I agree that now is the time for Foran to leave on his own accord, as I can't see the club being in any position to release him of his duties, but the board really need to answer for the years of neglect in the business side of things. We've had some fantastic players over the years go on free transfers. Why not (when a players contract is running out) speak to the player and ask where they want to be next year, and if they are hesitant in any way shape or form about staying with Caley, offer to put them up for transfer in January? A large portion of our best players came from the lower leagues in England where the transfer fees are arguably less than the average in the SPFL (maybe not by much, sometimes). Ryan Christie's sale could have brought in a whole bunch of players to rotate the squad, or maybe one or two players with a bit of class that could have been sold in a season or two.

Think he will be given until Christmas to get the team performing, and I think the cut off will be if we are no where near the play-offs minimum. Dundee winning 2-0 at Well just now so I think our fate is certain, as if there were any doubts really. They probably cant afford to get rid of him. cheaper to punt Brian Rice and get Mo assisting. Board tend to give our managers a better crack of the whip than many others would, and I think they will be very unwilling to push Richie, with this status as player and ex captain, and his spoken love of the club. Not trying to imply it would have changed things, but we have had no lucky breaks this season, piles of injuries to important players etc. Also our cup winning turn coat taking the budget certainly didnt help ( who appears to be taking Raif Rovers down into the play offs ) I do think the board might give Richie a bit of time with Malpas, since they gave him such a bad hand to play with in the first place. I have to say though, Malpas on his own as Manager would likely turn out just as poor. Our chance in the Championship will also be enhanced / reduced by who comes down with us!!

Right so I understand the obvious frustrations with foran and I ain't happy at our worst season In years... but this is how I think it will (and financially has to) go. it would cost upwards of £150k to boot foran before we consider rices contract. we are highly likely to be going down and will lose money. I can't see the board punting foran with the potential costs involved (unless there are any clauses we don't know about) no one new is going to change what happens in 4 games and that is a fact. richie will most likely stay and will be booted if after 3/4 months we aren't in the top two of the championship should our relegation be confirmed in the next few days. I am not saying I am entirely happy with this but rather than kill the club completely maybe we have to accept this severe injury and rehabilitate the best we can. im sure lots of you will disagree and that's fine but I'm trying to be realistic about what will happen and not go on about what I want to happen. i will forever support the club as that is what a true fan does - through the good and the bad. Let's hope this will be the low point and we build and become a strong club once again.

Fisher did ok at fullback as he did when he was playing up front . Sez it all about Foran that in the window he wasted his meagre budget bringing in McKay ,Ebbe and Anier when the answer was under his nose all along but refused to play him.

How can his position be defended now? Any club in the right mind would remove the manager. This is a complete joke

If Yogi could manage a football team half as good as he can talk, he'd be at a club far bigger than Raith Rovers.

5-1 win over Dunfermline, draw with unbeaten Celtic, beating Rangers. Surely they count for at least something?

Really? Let's take a look at what you said just before Hughes left and Foran came in. Hmm, so far it looks like you're pretty non plussed about Hughes leaving recognising that his style of play has it's limitations. Nothing obviously at this stage of anything suggesting that you had called out the new exciting brand of football as nonsense. Some pretty fair comments here, reservations about the lack of experience which was echoed by a number of ICT fans on here at the time and, with hindsight, a very accurate comment about needing an experienced number two. Still nothing about calling out the style of play as rubbish. Again, repeating the reservations concerning lack of experience but again nothing about calling out the new style of football as you claim. More doubts but ultimately comments hoping that Foran does well. I sense a pattern here. This is the last post of yours I could find close enough to the time of Forans appointment which talked about your thoughts on him taking charge. Yet again, no comments whatsoever about the style of play and indeed you thought we might even get into the top six! That's definitely setting your expectations quite low especially given your concerns about his lack of experience... You almost seem pleased that Foran has failed so you can tell everyone "I told you so!" yet it's also clear that some of the bold claims you are making now about being some kind of prophecy regarding calling out the style of football that was going to be on show are a load of bollocks.

Watched Sportscene last night and it's quite clear that County knew how one-footed Esson is, as they pressed him quite a few times in that manner on Friday. His lack of a right foot was always going to come back and bite him eventually and it's absolutely unacceptable that a professional footballer can't use both feet. He's been in the game for years, it should be second nature to him by now.