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2;42 - Gary Warren getting it right up the Jailend

Hang on a minute. Teams like Aberdeen and Mothewell have considerable experience fighting the drop. We have relatively little and from a motivational point of view we gained ground yesterday with a poor performance. We now focus on Hamilton and for either manager, a win will feel like an enormous boost. Potentially Hamilton have more to lose so may start more motivated - they have supporters boycotting the club, Canning is on a slightly worse run than ICT. It is difficult to imagine a second consecutive worse performance. So we all need to be positive about this game. Against Partick we eventually put out a solid back five. They all played well. The front six were out of sorts!! That does not mean that the six selected for Hamilton cannot take on a much better shape and will Billy likely to return we have another option. Boden is due to get some time and luck. Let us not go down the route chosen by the Hamilton supporters or indeed those of Kilmarnock. Steady as we go and focus wholeheartedly on not losing to Hamilton.

This is the time to believe we can get up to 10th place. After that we can revise our aspirations. However, here are some inspirational quotes to help us help the team: https://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2015/03/bill-shankly-quotes.html

I think it's actually a four year contract. It was a poor performance and that was a worrying post match interview but, as I said earlier in the thread, I think it was a decent point and we still have an opportunity to get off the bottom on Tuesday. I think that Foran still has a very great deal to learn but still has the potential to be a good manager for us. Don't forget that he had us playing successful and entertaining football in the League Cup group stage albeit against lower league opponents and was Manager of the Month after a successful league spell in September although that does seem a very long time ago now. Where I think we did cut corners, probably for financial reasons, is in appointing Brian Rice as assistant manager. An inexperienced manager needs a wiley and experienced number two. I didn't think that Rice was a good appointment when he first came, I didn't think it was a good idea to retain him when Yogi left and I'm even less convinced that he is the right man for the job now.

We've only won 3 games all season and yet remarkably we are only 6 points off 5th place! Clearly we have some problems and unless we start winning soon then we could become adrift at the bottom, but we are not at the "must win" stage yet. Richie seemed very pleased with the draw and I think he is right to take some positives from the game. We did generally look a little more solid at the back and managed a rare clean sheet. The draw took us a point closer to Hamilton, Motherwell and Dundee and improved our points per game ratio. In Cole, Mulraney and Doran we demonstrated that we have got creative players who are capable of creating chances - and before Mulraney and Doran came on, Tremarco could have had a hat-trick! Having said that, there were undoubtedly more negatives than positives. I was actually quite shocked to hear the manager say that Warren and Tansey were up last night with a vomiting bug. If so, why on earth were they playing? They should have been resting up at home and not risking passing a virus to their team mates. Playing them will also have taken a lot out of them and they may now be struggling for fitness for Tuesday's vital game. Draper could have dropped back to centre back with Vigurs and Doran starting instead. Can't have done their confidence much good being benched in favour of a couple of invalids. I don't know if Doumbouye was also not well but that was far and away the poorest I have seen him play. With competition for places quite hot, he should have been really fired up to keep his place but he looked disinterested and his control of the ball was poor. Unless he was also unwell he may be out of the side for a while. Anier had a chance to shine but unfortunately failed to impress. He seems unwilling to head the long balls to him and instead backs into defenders in an attempt to let the ball drop and turn the defender. It's a foul every time. He seemed to work reasonably hard but rarely really made himself available. The one time he did he was harshly adjudged to have fouled a defender. He certainly would be worth another start but rather than be a target man, he needs to play off someone who can win the ball better. Polworth was another who disappointed. He also seemed rather lacklustre today and gave the ball away rather too much. He had a couple of decent chances and really should have scored when put in with a cute pass from Draper. I'm surprised Cole was taken off rather than him because I thought Cole, while not at his best, had a reasonable game. In my view, Doran should have started and if only he could get a confidence boost with a goal he could reinvigorate us as an attacking force. Mulraney did his usual trick of exciting us only to then disappoint us immediately after. He does some great work on the wing to skin defenders but more often than not completely wastes the opportunity he has created. So it's a bit of a mixed bag. I do believe we have the players who can comfortably lift us clear of the relegation zone by the end of the season, but we need players who are fit and well and we need them to be hungrier for the ball than they were today. We need players to take responsibility for driving into the danger areas and looking to shoot. We need players scoring and feeding off the confidence that brings. At the moment we look disjointed going forward and that is perhaps due more to the manager than the players. There needs to be a shake up of tactics as we seem to be playing to our weaknesses rather than our strengths. It's not all doom and gloom yet, but we certainly do need to get back to winning ways soon. There may have been legitimate excuses for today's lack lustre performance, but the bottom line is that if we play like that for the rest of the season, we will be in the Championship next season.

It's good to be ambitious but there is no point in aiming for or talking about top six any more. That ship has sailed for this season. The battle is to avoid relegation and I still believe that's a battle we can win but we have to start turning things around now. This coming week is crucial. I think we need a minimum of 4 points from these two games. We may not be risking vertigo but the league will look a lot better from the 'height' of tenth place.

The positive from yesterday was the point and clean sheet. There were few defensive mishaps we got away with but maybe that's the break we've been missing. I get RF targeting top six if we aim too low and miss we'll be in the mire. We are needing some ugly wins on the board but it's not too late to get them.

Our recent record against Partick is very poor, with only one league win when there was little at stake at the end of last season, so a point can be seen as a positive in some ways. Our recent records away to Hamilton and home to Dundee are pretty good, so let's back Richie and the players and hopefully help them two badly needed good results. 23 points in a week's time has to be the aim! Let's go for it!!

Doofers Dad - was actually waiting fer yer post as you are one of the few that says it as it is - You are more depressing than any of the others, albeit sincere and trying to keep the stiff upper lip. You are probably spot on !! "The draw took us closer to Hamilton" - and what would a win have done and another at Hamilton ? Sorry and give me as many red dots as ya want but those comments from Foran today were totally pathetic.

I'm trying to find a positive in RF's comments, so bear with me: If accurate, he was faced with something of a crisis this morning, with a series of half-fit guys + some suffering from a sickness bug. It serms his solution in advance of the game was (a) to cover up these issues (good plan) and (b) to hike the importance of the game to "must win", with the idea of galvanising a fighting performance from the players (always dangerous). The season has just been a series of frustrations - we've not been fortunate with injuries, which has highlighted our lack of depth. RF has continually fiddled with formation and personnel, with some surprise choices week after week. Much of this is enforced, but some smacks of poor judgement from an inexperienced manager. The frustration is that this collection of players is not relegation material, but the team is right now. It is the manager's respinsibility to mould players into a team and Richie needs to learn fast. Consistant performers are: Mackay, Tremarco, Draper (today aside) Guys who we know can do it, but are erratic: Fon Williams, Warren, Tansey, Doran, Polworth, Vigurs, Meekings (currently injured), Raven (just back from injury), Cole Fringe players with potential: King, Mulraney Unknown quantities: Anier, Boden, Ebbe Not sure where Doumbouya fits! Richie - build your team around your consistant performers, all in their best positions. Find a way to get the best out of your erratic performers: Drop those that have bad days, no favouritism. Your formation is determined by the players at your disposal. 4-4-2 didn't work today because under-fit players were selected in midfield. Why? Doran was dropped, but is coming in to form and is fully fit, so find a formation to accommodate him. If Draper and Tansey aren't fit, go with the guys that are! Frustrating! That was a game we could have won, but were nowhere near winning because the wrong team was fielded.

I think we all knew that appointing Foran was a risk, but I also know that the financial constraints we work under probably made him the only viable option at the time. But why a 3 year contract? Surely a 1 year rolling contract would have been more sensible. And now we are seeing that his inexperience is a real problem for us. These interviews he gives are cringeworthy. Can he really be that naive? He doesn't look the part, sound the part, or act the part of someone who knows what they are doing. I fear the worst, and can only hope that I am wrong.

Lack of fight and too often 2nd to the ball, got criticised for suggesting this before but I don't see us having a team of battlers and fighters out there where those around us do and being regular struggles at that end of the table know how to scrape and fight to stay up. It may have been a clean sheet but we were lucky and Partick despite having chances were poor in front of goal - we are not getting better at defending and instead of bringing in average players we need an experienced defensive minded coach to assist. The tactics are dross and predictable. Long hopeless balls, a keeper who can't pass and has awful distribution. We play strikers who can't compete in the air or have the physical attributes to hold up the ball or give an out when under pressure. Our wingers don't run the line or press on, the play or cut inside too often and for mulraney with his pace he can drop back to pick up the ball to run at defenders no point him standing off the defender and expecting to win high balls. On this display we are on an express route to relegation, maybe sickness was a reason but seems we always have an excuse but never a solution. Can try dress this game up with positives but reality is we were dross all over the park and 2nd best side by a margin and that's without even considering the lack of entertainment.

Our keeper really upped his game and pulled off some excellent saves. The defence held firm, assisted with the protection of midfield to claim a much needed clean sheet. Better positioning for picking up the 2nd ball when taking corners too. Subs Vigurs had a good game, so did Doran and Mulraney, we could have really punished them on the counter attack with Mulraney and Doran but it's a work in progress. Once the confidence builds, I can see us as possible top six but I think the majority of us fans would be happy with a bit of daylight between the bottom 2 positions and us. Anier was showing there's quality about him but his biggest battle was the ref instead of the back line. The linesman missed an obvious offside when the ball hit the cross bar, plus others, let off a Partick player when offside for chasing the ball on the way back to OFW which I thought, fair enough as he kind of didn't interfere with play yet when the tables were turned and we had a player off side but more importantly one onside in a dangerous position the flag goes up. A lot of positives to take down to Hamilton, to play against a team whos fans are planning to start boycotting their matches.

Do we really need 7 stewards standing all round 20 kids, half a metre from their faces because they are singing at a football game. Why don't the club just ban all singing and kids from the games.That'll ensure we have no future support...

Agree. Imho this really is the time for a morale boosting win.

If we don't eliminate that gap some time we will be going down. We have a decent record on artificial surfaces. Without throwing caution to the wind, we need to be going for the win.

...what I'd pay for a Shinnie/Mckay combo these days: All our problems would disappear!

Hats (or shoes!) off to all ICT fans who can make it to this. Let's hope the Hamilton fans boycott this one and take away some of the home advantage. RF needs to really identify who's properly fit for this one. If Drapes and/or Tansey aren't 100%, don't play them (I think Draper's said previously that artificial pitches don't agree with him anyway). I don't say that lightly, particularly in Draper's case, but he was nowhere near fit on Saturday and early returns from injury generally result in further setbacks. Once he has his fit and healthy team list, then decide the formation that is going to suit the players available. Where there are choices, go with form players in their best positions. For me, Doran is coming into form, so should play, perhaps behind the striker. Raven looked a bit rusty, but quite solid on Saturday, so we have a right back and Mackay did well in the centre, so the back four is good. The real problem remains up front with Doumbouya, Boden and Anier taking it in turns to fail to impress. Assuming everybody is fit, I think our personnel suit a 4-2-3-1 better than a 4-4-2, but that should remain an oprion if we use fully fit players in midfield (unlike Saturday, when it was full of crocked players!) I'd go with: Fon Williams Raven Mackay Warren Tremarco Tansey Vigurs/Polworth Cole Doran King Anier subs: Polworth, Mulraney, Doumbouya, Esson, Ebbe + U20 defender + Esson Another option would be to have Tansey as only holding midfielder and put Polworth or Vigurs alongside Doran in CAM. Neither Polly nor Vigurs are natural holding midfielders and Crawford has to be marked out of the game. RF needs to really get this one right and apply some logic. No square pegs in round holes. No room for error.

On the positive side, that was a good point and it's a clean sheet. On the other hand we were dreadful and Partick should be disappointed they didn't take all three points. We started with a different shape, 4-4-2 with Doumbaya and Anier up front and a midfield of Cole, Tansey, Draper and Polworth. I can see the logic in that line up, narrowing the midfield, try to get width from the full backs and a partnership up front with one powerful and one pacy forward. The problem was that Doumbaya simply had no idea what he was doing, a shockingly bad performance from him. He has no idea what runs to make, where to go in the pitch, how to link with Anier. It was embarrassing to be honest and, after a tactical change which put Doumbaya on his own front, Vigurs was subbed in for Doumbaya before half time. We then reshuffled to have Draper playing pushed up, Vigurs and Tansey deeper with Anier in his own up front and Polworth and Cole wider. While all this was going on, Partick were far more threatening and used the ball well - Azeez was denied by Fon Williams from a couple of yards out, a shocking miss really. Fon Williams had another couple of great saves in the first half. Clearly with all these changes we had zero fluency, I don't think we put together a decent passage of play once in the entire game. We hit long balls for Anier to chase or contest and got nothing out of it really. For most of the game we didn't look as though we knew where out players were supposed to be, we didn't have any decent outlets, we didn't look like we had any plans for attacking the opposition or getting the ball to dangerous areas. The only time we looked threatening was when we subbed on Aaron Doran, who had a couple of opportunities including one shot from the edge of the area that inched past. Its puzzling that Doran was dropped after being one of our best players last week and he will surely have played himself into contention for the Accies game. It comes back to what I said earlier in the season - it's as if we just throw players into the team without really thinking about what we want them to do. We change players in the midfield all the time, we don't have any thought about what we're wanting to do. Liam Polworth had his position moved repeatedly yesterday, right to left to right. No wonder the guy hit some misplaced passes. Larnell Cole was one of our best players recently and he was moved about and then subbed off. Mulreany came on and had a couple of successful moments against their full back but his passing and crossing is poor. He can be a valuable player but needs to smarten up and learn to play properly. Anier didn't really do much but he had little service. We hit balls up to him and he tried but looked more interested in trying to win a foul than anything else. He got away once and looked to have been fouled but nothing was given. Defensively we kept a clean sheet but we've got OFW to thanks for that, some very poor use of the ball around our own box and organisational failures were on display, especially in the first half. Apparently Gary Warren had been ill during the week which may explain that. The game in midweek is massive and it's hard to see from that performance how we can win. Hopefully it comes together but I'm saying that more in hope than expectation

I agree 100% with these views. I also hope I'm wrong but, with no win since October, it's difficult to see how RF can turn this around. Recent performances haven't given any hope from what I have read. Lets see what he can do this coming Tuesday down in Hamilton. Let us see his motivational skills in raising the spirits of a lack lustre team, let us see his attacking style of play, let us see how we can make more than two or three passes without giving the ball away, let us see another clean sheet and let us see goals going in at the right end. Somehow, I think my eyes will be closed and I won't see any of this

I think that's our problem Richie is stuck with an assistant that was not his choice but we are stuck with him.

Foran's final sentence reminded me of something... The Caley Thistle team eh? A great bunch of lads.

28th January, Partick Thistle Thats our 3rd clean sheet in all competitions. 2 games unbeaten and I think that's something to build on. Or we could just tie ourselves up in knots dwelling on all the mistakes and defeats.

When this latest deal was finalised, the BBC admitted that it was operating on commercial grounds rather than "community" or whatever grounds you might call it. In other words, they've stopped pretending that they serve all of us.

Waaaaah!!!!!!!!! Shot myself in the foot with that one - well done Mr CJ (and a couple of great draw picks from Team Gringo)

I particularly liked the challenging questions, the opening one was a belter which really got to the crux of the fans' concerns....

I will never agree more with a post, I was absolutely gobsmacked listening to that interview

This season has been a shambles and I hope that Richie keeps the 4-4-2 and bins the insipid 1 up front mentality which has got us into this position. His faith in Tansey and Doumbouya is another faux-pas. Tansey is disinterested and his head is in Aberdeen. The Walrus is a bumbling, stumbling lower league player. Then we chop and change all the time. Richie has his below par stand ins and almost picks the team on a playground week to week basis. And for those saying this was not a must-win are deluding themselves. Today, Hamilton and Dundee are ALL must win games and even if we grab three draws we are in the mire. We simply can't afford to let a gap develop at the bottom. Let's just hope that we are still in the hunt when the split starts. Oh and confidence comes with winning. The longer we hang on the harder it becomes and we do not look as if we have the soldiers to get out of the trenches. There are not enuff who look as if they are playing for the shirt.

To inject a positive note, I think Richie was wrong to label this match 'must win'. A point against an in form Partick side who have been a bit of a bogey team for us even when we have been on good form in recent seasons is not a bad result especially bearing in mind the rare clean sheet. An opportunity to lift ourselves of the bottom on Tuesday will hopefully lift a bit of the spectator gloom as well.

Quote: “However, it is worth revisiting the issue of the disproportionately low fee that Scottish football gets for its TV rights. Simple arithmetic indicates that if Sky and BT are happy to pay £1.712bn a year for English football the comparable figure for Scotland should be £142m (Scotland has 8.3% of the population of the UK). To be getting just over one tenth of that at £15m a year needs to be reviewed. “Equally the BBC gives just £1m a year to Scotland’s football clubs against £66m for its Match of the Day highlights. These figures are only exacerbating the gap between English and Scottish football and should be examined in more detail by the appropriate authorities.” This is from the BDO annual report on the EPL and SPL . My suggestion is that the fans tell the TV companies where to go by not attending televised games and not buying tv packages if you really want to change things, the only thing sky and BT understand is loss of revenue. IF 200,000 football supporting Scots pay Sky £500pa that's £100M, save your money and use it to buy a season ticket for your local team, these companies would soon get the message.You could save the game and your club by doing so, otherwise half the current SPL will be part time within 10 years.. Disclosure: I don't watch Sky BT or most other TV.

Saturday 28 Jan 2017 SL1 R McAllister (2) (Peterhead 4 - Queens Park 0) J Gorman (Stenhousemuir 4 - Airdrieonians 2) SL2 S Sutherland (Hat trick) (Elgin C 3 - Edinburgh C 1) Highland League D Park (2) (Cove R 7 - Fort William 0) M Finnis (Turriff 4 - Clach 2)

Hey, there are plenty of negative threads and posts just now. Can we maybe keep this one for positive nostalgia

I was going to post but there is so much negativity going around I've decided not to bother. Patience is a virtue don't you know

I have a lot of sympathy for Mantis' payoff line about Sky. Wage levels are absurdly high in the EPL and are in turn forcing other clubs to live very dangerously. To be realistic, wage levels across the game are unrealistically high in relation to true market value and performamce levels. Even if you look at a stadium near you, does working productively once a fortnight in front of 3-4000 people and every alternate week to allow another club's players to do the same justify being paid a ballpark £1K a week? And you can possibly extend that question even further when applied to a stadium not quite so near you. Then there's the Highland League where some can get hundreds a week and four figure signing on fees for not being very good, training once or twice a week and playing in front of a few hundred. This is nonsense. DD makes a couple of very interesting points and I am going to have to think long and hard about the proposotion that smaller clubs can't afford decent players in relation to the question - where, then, are these decent players going if the rich clubs are already full of more decent ones? Then there's the question of compensation for having your game televised. Is that not, in effect, what the broadcasters already pay the leagues for through their contract fees?

Just listened to Richie - sorry that is incredulous. What must the players on the bench think if half fit individuals are being preferred. That should have been the other way around !!

Are we feckin shittting ourselves this season or wot ?

A season definer ? only in as much as we may not make the top six !