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As per usual, some nonsensical comments on here after this defeat. Let's be honest, most of the fans wanted Foran as the manager so some of the comments made about his management style/tactics etc are the pot calling the kettle black. Of course Foran will make mistakes but he has to be given time to learn his trade and someone has alrteady pointed out, that is why he has been given a 4 year contract. Some of the comments about Foran being too calm on the touchline are just nonsense, you don't have to be shouting at the players all the time to be a good manager, in fact I would say it should be the opposite as the players should be given the responsibility to do their job. Would you want your boss standing over you all the time?. As for yesterday, poor defending cost us the game, end of story. What football was played was only played by ICT as County were content to sit in after scoring their goals and even attempt to time waste during the first half. We were outmuscled by County as well which is a first for me but they are a big physical team this season while we appear to be more lightweight than in seasons gone by. Too many players lost the physical challenge yesterday, not helped by a referee who seemed incapable of recognising a foul. Don't get the criticism of McNaught from some as he was not culpable for the first goal, Warren and Raven saw to that and Raven very culpable for the second. Fon Williams and Warren culpable for the third. Obviously mistakes need to be cut out and getting Meekings back is a priority. To me, Raven has not played well this season and if this continues, needs to be dropped to give Horner a chance. I also don't think we can play Vigurs and Polworth together week in week out as they are too similar and provide little defensive cover in midfield. Therein lies part of the problem as we are playing a very attacking formation but lacking some defensive midfield cover. I genuinely think that with a few tweaks we will be okay this season but okay means staying up and avoiding the play offs. No doubt some will say we are regressing as a club but, let's be honest, we have been punching above our weight and it is going to take a couple of seasons to start to get back perhaps, to where we were. As for the referee yesterday, to be blunt, he was totally out of his depth and lost control of the game. The situation around our first goal was farcial as was his failure to sent Boyce off the field after he had received treatment. It took Draper to point this out to him. Raven got a booking for nothing while Davies fouled Boden and others all afternoon with the referee totally oblivious. One foul he gave against Draper was truly astonishing as the County player was climbing all over him. Keep the faith and support the team. As for Dougal, your posts are truly astonishing in their quality. Please post elsewhere

Noticed a few comments on the poor crowd. Simply put, it's down to pricing. £25-£30 depending on where you sit is an absolute disgrace for any match. I completely understand why this would put people off. This is not a strategy to grow our fan Base.

As soon as Boyce scored so early the writing was on the door for us, we were second to everything and what's worrying is that County are in very poor form so yesterday was already a six pointer Losing three goals at home tells it's own story, any team that ships so many home goals the warning bells should be ringing I watched both management teams at points in the game and the difference between the two managers alone were chalk and cheese Foran just stood their in silence for large parts while Macintyre was shouting instructions constantly, ok you could argue its naivety on Forans part but even their appearance yesterday speaks volumes Macintyre looked like a boss in his suit however Foran looked like he was dressed for a stroll around the Eastgate, that Cardigan was a real shocker However it's still early days I suppose and once CaleyD comes on and tells us it was a great performance, how unlucky we were and how big the attendance was it will reassure us that we are all worrying over nothing Dougal

Anyone that thought this season was going to be easy is living in a dream world! New manager, new system, new players....Not going to be an instant success!

If you weren't at the match, don't let the scoreline fool you into thinking this was a close game. 3-2 flattered us; if County had won by three or four there would have been little to complain about. Other than the abysmal performance, of course... We looked completely unprepared for this game. County always press us high up the pitch right at the start..yet we didn't seem to have anticipated this at all. We barely got out of our own half in the first quarter of the game, because we kept giving the ball away or having to punt aimless long balls. All of the goals we conceded were dreadful in their own way. We may as well have not had any defenders on the park at the first goal. Gardyne was allowed lots of space and time to cross and Boyce was inexplicably unmarked about eight yards out. McNaughton had been marking him, yet ended up about three yards away from him and miles underneath the ball. The second goal might have been prevented had we not taken so long over substituting McNaughton (who took ages to limp off) that we had to play with 10 men. It was a great first touch and finish by Boyce, mind, but if we'd not been playing a defender short it probably would have been preventable. Despite the fact that McNaughton clearly couldn't continue, Foran didn't bother summoning Horner for a good minute or two afterward. Amateurish. For what it's worth, Raven (who Gardyne had on toast in the opening 15 mins) was a far better centre-back than McNaughton. The third goal, the obligatory soft-goal-conceded-from-a-set-piece (three games in a row now!) was completely deflating, coming right at the start of the second half. The long punt forward hung in the air for aeons. Any half-decent keeper, and most lousy ones, would have come for it and claimed it. Fon Williams stayed rooted to his line. Worryingly, Warren was beaten remarkably easily in the air by Boyce. Earlier, Fon Williams handled outside his box, but the ref played advantage and County inexplicably missed with the goal gaping. Had it not been for the advantage, the keeper might have seen red instead of the subsequent yellow. As for us, it sounds like our first goal was extremely fortunate, as County fans (and a few ICT ones) are saying the ref blew his whistle for an apparent finfringement before Boden scored, only to change his mind after the ball went in and he'd spoken to his linesman. The County players were absolutely incensed. The second was a great hit by Draper, but apart from a goalline clearance from Cikos shortly after, we didn't really look like scoring. Lots and lots and lots to worry about. The body language from the players was terrible. It was striking that, during stoppages from injuries, the County players were receiving instruction and encouragement from their bench, whilst our management team stood with arms folded and our players wandered away from each other with hands on hips and heads down. No-one looked like they wanted the ball except Boden, who rarely got it within about ten yards of where he was, and Tremarco, who was the only other player worth a pass mark. We had four very decent midfielders on the pitch - Draper, Tansey, Polworth and Vigurs - all of whom were really poor in possession. Anyone watching that fiasco could make the mistake of thinking that we had a rookie manager who was way out of his depth...

Are we looking for new players ? if we were able to sign the completed player we would need to blow apart our much heralded budget limitations. However consider Mulrahney probably quickest player in Spfl albeit we need to give him the right delivery to allow him make use of his pace. Macnaughton one of the best readers of a game we have seen at Inverness ( regretfully now by all accounts injured) Billy King has ability to skin players ,cross a ball and also score goals you obviously have only judged him on this game jury out with Boden but at least he is streaks ahead of Hughes offerings newly formed teams generally take a little while to blend so happy to give "potential"a chance

hows that old caley girl?

I'm surprised you could see anything from under the bridge.

Such a shocking turn-out! far too many empty seats for our first league home-match of the season. For those that have to 'pick and choose' you would like to think that this would be one of the ones they would pick?! Shockingly low attendance from the travelling folk, who have their shortest trip to make?! unbelievable! disappointed with the result. happy that i got my monies worth though. definitely entertaining; i may not be right too many times, but i did propose that we would see very few 0-0's, and i stand by that. yes, it would have been nice to beat the wee team, but i think most of us are losing perspective, probably as a result of the successful pre-season and the games against Dunf and Arbroath - we are a team very-much in transition, where survival is our number 1 priority. Yes, it'd be nice to score 4 goals every week, and win easily, but that's just not going to happen - the league is much tighter this year, and we're just not there yet. I read somewhere on here that the club ,must be ruing their decision to give Richie such a long contract; and they need to back him etc. well, these results I think, are why they have given him the length of contract, and THAT is how they are backing him. Richie at the helm is a long-term project, these things take time. By giving him this length of contract they are saying 'we know its gonna be tough, but we're sticking by you'. And it's clear they have released funds for signing new players - that we are not getting more over the line could be for a multitude of reasons that many of us just will not fully appreciate - agents fee's, extreme wages, contract lengths, and, oh yes, maybe the players just don't want to move to the sneck! Who could blame them - being boo'd by your own support, half an hour into the first home game of the season! I haven't seen/heard any post-match from Richie, but i would assume that he wont blame the referee and will say we weren't good enough, but that's one of the worst referee'd games I have seen! Cunty could've had a couple close to two yellows, Draper could easily have picked up a second Yellow. the whole OFW outside the box thing. Draper being strangled in the box. Tansy being floored in the box. Boden scoring after the whistle had gone. Just so many things that went for us and against us. Just laughable. Slight improvement from Partick game Anyway, on to the next one....Down the Gorgie in a weeks time, lets hope their is another slight improvement for that one. Lets get behind our team! COME ON CALEY THISTLE!!!!

It was on at 6.30! Now on BBC 2 early evening slot

If County were still in the cup their fans would be far more confident of a win and would have turned up in greater numbers. So it looks like the County fans lack of belief in their team cost us money.

Ha Ha. You forgot to mention the flare being used on the castle.

That's clearly a bald headed eagle and not a golden eagle....and not sure we're allowed to use a shield due to heraldry laws....back to the drawing board P.S. You've also got too many pricks on the thistle....there was never that many of them!!

It looked like Richie was going for the 'smart casual' look and to be fair I thought he pulled it off quite well. His seasonal colour coordination was also spot on, with grey being appropriately Autumnal. Both managers also benefited from the 'ugly friend effect' when standing next to their respective deputies. Have to say though, I thought MacIntyre's flash designer suit was a bit pretentious and OTT for standing next to a football pitch, bit of an American Psycho vibe there. Otherwise a fashion masterclass.

Is it just me that thinks we have more problems than a badge? Personally I dont care re the changes so far. However I would be up in arms if we removed the thistle and eagle tbh

Hmm. The tactic of not marking Boyce didn't really work, did it? Disappointing result and very definitely 2nd best. It was crap but at least it wasn't boring. Foran is clearly on a steep learning curve, but in his defence I would say that between the Arbroath and the County games we have already had about as much incident as we had in the entire season last year under Hughes. An absolutely sublime strike by Drapes for the 2nd. The player we are missing most from last season? Danny Devine.

Where to begin. The first goal was a disaster. I could see from the north stand that the marking was all wrong. And sure enough, Boyce was given the freedom of the box to score. Number two was as a result of poor organisation after McNaughton went off. We got ourselves back into the game just before half-time - great time to score, but then shot ourselves in the foot by conceding a poor third. Draper got it back to 3-2, but despite having nearly half an hour, we couldn't get an equaliser, although we created some chances. I really hope that one of Foran's talents is an ability to learn quickly. We need to work on our defending as a priority. We are very susceptible to a cross ball, and we keep letting balls bounce rather than dealing with them. There was no communication between Fon Williams and the defence, and this hesitancy led to a number of problems, We also have a tendency to try and play out of trouble rather than clearing our lines - I'd hoped to see the last of that. There was also a lack of pace and urgency to begin with. And Tansey, Draper, Vigurs and Polworth are too similar in midfield. Having said that, there were some positives. Boden does seem to have an ability to make the ball stick, and makes some good runs. I thought the three subs had good games, Horner going to right-back and Raven to centre-half actually made the defence look a bit more solid (not that that would have been difficult). Mulraney looked lively - maybe his role will be as an impact player - and Doran gave us a spark that had been missing. We actually created some decent chances today, but it won't matter if we can't keep them out at the other end. Not time to press the panic button yet. Just need to dust down that copy of "Defending for Dummies"...

"Have you considered that the information on Meekings might have been given to keep Partick guessing on our team and formation" If you believe that you are living on another planet man..

Well ICT's ticket costs directly had an influence on yesterday's attendance, I think I heard the official attendance was given as 4k + but it certainly didn't look that much to me anyway Both home and away supports very sparse, think it's time that the commercial side sit down and rethink Would be interesting to see all the attendances at Highland derbies over the last 20+ years to see how yesterday's compares Pity Sneckboy wasn't still about or banned as he would have these figures at hand Dougal

Foran turned up in his suit, as are the players now, which I think is a good change that Richie has made. it's funny really, everyone shouts for more direct, attacking football, but in doing so, you leave yourself vulnerable to losing goals. you cant have it both ways. we criticise the team for playing out from the back, then moan when they play a hopeful long ball, or try and slip through a pass that gets cut out. WE asked for change. we got it. time to deal with the consequences. A six-pointer - the second game of the season - get a grip!

Whether it was designed to keep out the riff-raff or was simply an SPL vanity project, you are absolutely spot on with that gingerjaggy!

Oh the irony Bannerman trying to rubbish a story because he thinks it's fabricated to suit the authors agenda LOLZ Dougal

pride of the highlands my ar*e!

That's it. I'm sick of all this unrest so I demand that our football club take the name of the company that runs it. INVERNESS THISTLE AND CALEDONIAN FOOTBALL CLUBS LTD

Match is on Alba. Malraney looks promising but the continual high direct ball to him from goal seemed pretty ineffective, unless it's played into space for him to collect from defence or midfield or perhaps a quick goal kick to him on the halfway line and he was looking for it a few times and didn't get. A lot of good things to take from the game and if our new signing is out injured for a while then hopefully we aren't far away from having the leagues best centre back pairing back in action together again.

For the umpeenth season in a row we are left in mid August scratching around looking for new players whilst every other team has completed their business. No wonder so many people chose not to attend yesterday when we are once again at the tale end in more ways than one. Yesterday was my first sight of the 4 new guys. I certainly didn't see anything to excite me about any of them. We were totally outclassed by a much stronger, together team from over the bridge. Davis was like a magnet all day and must have a sair heed at the number of headers he had. Why when there were breaks in play did you see the County team crowded round their manager presumably for words of encouragement and Ritchie not once called anyone over? Similarly why did we not see our captain encouraging the new boys during these breaks. We did not look like a happy, together team. Tansey looked like a man with moving ideas in his head! However we must keep the faith and believe that there are a couple of signings to come in.