RiG

Which in itself is an absolutely ridiculous decision to allow them to stay in the league. ICT had an SPL budget last season and I'm aure they could have put together an SPL budget for this year if they wanted. But whatever budget you come up with doesn't give you the right to "choose" what division you play in. Livi can't say "We have a Division 1 budget for the club" and be granted a place in SFL1 based on that alone. The guff spouted by some Livi supporters and McDougal and Rankines hilarious attempt at "blackmailing" the SFL to stay in the league was incredible. They backed the SFL into a corner in the last week and it has backfired big time. I have every sympathy with the players and staff who look likely to lose their jobs. However I have even more sympathy for the people Livi have screwed over only to end up in the mess they are now. But what about creditors who had to make make their staff redundant thanks to Livi pissing away money they didn't have and shafting them by not paying them? Livi are getting their comeuppance and it's about damn time. They have shafted so many people in a short space of time they can no longer be allowed to get away with it. Whilst the fans might not have been able to do much the SFL cannot tolerate financial mis-management especially from a team who is rapidly developing a history of it.

Livi relegated to the 3rd Division :lol:

I'm driving down from Aberdeen (train prices are obscene) with two Fifers.

If what is being mentioned on P & B is correct then we are at home v Albion Rovers. EDIT: Full Draw: 1. INVERNESS CALEDONIAN THISTLE -v- ALBION ROVERS 2. FORFAR ATHLETIC -v- DUNDEE 3. DUNFERMLINE ATHLETIC -v- RAITH ROVERS 4. ARBROATH -v- ST. JOHNSTONE 5. PARTICK THISTLE -v- QUEEN OF THE SOUTH 6. ALLOA ATHLETIC -v- DUNDEE UNITED 7. HIBERNIAN -v- BRECHIN CITY 8. ROSS COUNTY -v- HAMILTON ACADEMICAL 9. KILMARNOCK -v- MORTON 10. AYR UNITED -v- ST. MIRREN

Might not agree with you Alex - especially with the Livi prediction! 6th!? - but at least your giving it a shot. It's not as if our predictions are going to have any bearing on what actually happens! Give it a shot :)

Good good. Do anything exciting? Incidetnally, I assume you live in Dornoch? Lovely wee place. I've got Grandparents who stay just outside the village / town. Completely agree. Whilst I think Dundee will win the league I don't expect them to walk it. The only sizeable gap will be between whoever finishes in 9th and Livi at the bottom in 10th place.

Some really "bold" predictions so far then...

1. Dundee 2. Inverness Caledonian Thistle 3. Partick Thistle 4. Dunfermline 5. Queen of the South 6. Greenock Morton 7. Ross County 8. Ayr United 9. Raith Rovers 10. Livingston :017: Airdrie

:017:

Erm, no not at all. Thanks for asking though, it was really considerate of you. Did you have a nice day yourself? :017:

No RiG is realistic as to the challenge facing ICT this season and is well aware it is not the walk in the park that some seem to think but is looking forward to it all the same ;) I have no way of backing up my point of view so I am going to resort to insults instead.

Your points were as follows: We have better players Highly questionable if we do in fact have better players, especially compared to Dundees squad. Their forward line for example is the kind you assemble in a game of Football Manager (except it's for SFL1). Whilst I am not writing our lads off I am realistic to know that "we have better players" is simply not true. a vital mix of young and experianced players I think you'll find pretty much every team has this in SFL1. How exactly this sets us apart from the other sides and makes us better I don't really know. Would be interested in finding out though. we have players that are both new to Scottish football and could intoduce some flair to our game That's good. I'm sure supporters of SFL clubs will tell you all about the number of "flair players" this division and how well they do :( There are also plenty of players who are new to Scottish football who are going to be facing us next season for other clubs so this point can be applied to others also no? also players who have got both SPL and SFL experiance As with the majority of your points this can be applied to plenty of other teams in our league. What makes our ones so special? What players in our squad have significantly more SPL experience than other teams players? Munro? Tokely? Rooney? Barrowman? SPL experience can be a positive thing to have within the squad, depending how you look at it. Dundee have just as much SPL experience as we do. I can see your insular bubble bursting in big style over the course of the forthcoming season. My main point is that everything you say that supposedly sets us aside from other teams in our quest to win the title can in fact be applied to just about any other SFL1 club and can certainly be applied to those expected to challenge for the title this year. I think we will be up there, I think we will challenge and give it a good go but over the course of the season I still think Dundee have too much in their locker and they can improve their team again if they need to due to their cash reserves if things aren't going quite the way they want. That said, maybe the tag of favourties will be a hinderance to them. Let's hope so.

I was whooshed :(

Eh? You are aware my post was dripping with irony right?

It's Caley Ds fault we got relegated. He never played Basshunter! :P :P

That's the kind of arrogance you'd expect from an OF fan. This paragraph could be applied to Dunfermline, Dundee, QotS, Ross County and so on so I fail to see why we are radically different. The "Having better players" is highly debateable. I think a lot of our fans are going to be in for a real shock this season.

Forgot about Forfar! I am trying to mind if these games take place on a Saturday or a Tuesday / Wednesday. If the former then I don't care too much as I'll try and get to it anyway (especially if it is in Inverness) but if it is the latter then something near to Aberdeen :023:

From a completely selfish point of view - Arbroath away please.

Why don't you volunteer to do it? It's beyond pathetic. And I bet those whinging are the ones who will moan about it but if they are challenged to do a better job they will shirk it. I think Caley D was too loud but that was it. I appreciated the comment about the Annan player being okay because he looked in some state when he was taken off so it was good to hear he as okay. I don't listen to the announcer really anyway so I don't really care either way. But if those are greeting about his style really don't like it why don't you give it a bash? I'm sure the club would love to hear from you. Don't all rush at once now...

Barrowman isn't "sh!te". That's the kind of thing a "wingeing t%at" would say.

There seems to be a lot of rubbish on this thread about Main Standers abusing ICT players at games and giving them grief. The North Stand inhabitants are just as good at it so I think some of the folk putting the argument forward need to open their eyes (ears?) to what's going on around them. Main Stand has the best view of the ground but I prefer the NS because I have always been going to the terracing behind the goals there and wanted to remain there when the "stands" went in.

Caley D said Girls Aloud was well received by the crowd and has asked for me for more music to play. I have sent him my 5ive Greatest Hits CD along with some Backstreet Boys to play for the Home game v Ayr.

We were lucky enough to be treated to two of the most hilarious pieces of skill perhaps ever witness from ICT players. Djebi Zadi - standing on the touchline he received a strong pass from Munro (?) which was hit far too high, far too strong and yet he simply flicked his right foot up in the air behind him and booted the ball back into play! Tokely - deciding to take things into his own hands in the second half Rosscoe gathered the ball up and stormed off down the right. Weaving past one player, knocking it around another and outpacing him the big man topped it off with a ridiculous back heeled pass that split two Annan boys and only just failed to find another ICT player. He had a wee chuckle to himself afterwards! So guys and girls, which one was the more outrageous for you?

Pretty easy win for us yesterday and whilst we took a wee while to get going we were clicking by the end as Annan tired badly. Definitely some positives to take from the game yesterday. I thought Stratford was more suited to his midfield role than a right back. Cox was strong in the middle again. Not one to shirk a challenge. He is like Ian Black in that aspect except he doesn't kill the player. His passing / creativity might not be as good but he has a tremendous work ethic and that will endear him to the support. Tokely in at RB was a huge boost to us as he worked well with Eagles / Imrie on the right and got forward a fair amount. Djebi Zadi found some good space at times on the left. The result of which was some fantastic overlapping and allowed us to create a lot of space and time for our players to whip balls into the penalty area for the strikers to attack. Not all were good crosses but I was a lot more impressed with our build up play than against Montrose. Barrowman would have loved to have been involved yesterday with the amount of crosses going into the six yard area. I was also impressed with Juanjo Mk II. He seemed to drop off the main striker to pick the ball up, drop a shoulder then turn the other way. Looks like a good player to have the final third and could open up defences for us when we are attacking. Would be interested to see how he plays maybe just behind a front two with someone like Cox in the middle doing the spade work with Eagles and Imrie wide. Imrie turned in a solid performance but maybe still a bit too greedy with the ball. Eagles looked reasonable enough as well. Overall much more impressive than last week and a lot more positives to take from the afternoon. We'll still need to pick it up for the game against Dunfermline though. Might take a while for some players to settle into their right positions in the team. Can we afford that?

Why bar Barrowman?