Scotty

This year we have two winners to pick - Someone to receive a signed shirt from Matthew Strachan and someone else from Mitchell Robertson. All names are eligible for both draws. How it works: The names in the hat for each season are based on the members who joined the sponsorship group each year. The draw itself is conducted using a random generator website. We use Wheel of Names as most others we have used in the past no longer exist or now require a paid subscription. [https://wheelofnames.com/]. There is no option to publicly display the draw results so the video of the random picker is shown below. The draw is completely and utterly random and no-one on CTO or within ICT has any influence or control over the names that come up. This is important to note as there are people connected with the club and with CTO who have subscribed and are therefore eligible and who are not excluded from the draw. Winner - Matthew Strachan's shirt: @Hiro Winner - Mitchell Robertson's shirt: @The Fly see below for the actual draw. If anyone has any concerns or questions about this process, please feel free to PM me or mention it in the thread below. Winners - please send me through a message and confirm if it is ok for me to provide your details to the office staff @ the Stadium. Winners.mp4

Unfortunately, it appears that Kevin Keegan has lost his battle. RIP KK.

For me the build-up was more cringe than half-time. Even though the USA was not playing, you can get past the powerhouse that is Jennifer Hudson belting out the star-spangled banner given it is done at pretty much every sporting event in the US regardless of which sport or which level. We get this (and Oh Canada) at TFC before every game unless its TFC -V Vancouver or Montreal in which case we get just the Canadian one. What I don't like is how everyone feels the need to personalise it. Just sing the f***ing song! The real cringe came with Tom Cruise, whose monologue still defies explanation, and also with Robbie Williams - what was going on with his hair! Guess it was windy down there! or he didn't put on enough gel! I also noticed all the product placement. Since when did the World Cup trophy travel in a Luis Vuitton case? I have to say I wasn't bothered about the half-time show, but 10 minutes of Shakira might have sufficed if we had to have something. She is still easy on the eye, her hips don't lie, and she is synonymous with the world cup ever since Waka-Waka in 2010. Given she is South American - although Colombians and other South American countries are typically no fans of Argentina - and she also spent many years in Spain with her ex-partner Gerard Pique she was well suited to this game and is forever associated with football. We didn't need Madonna and her drivers, Justin Bieber, Ted Lasso or the muppets although they did miss a chance to cast a couple of real individuals as Waldorf and Statler. The game itself was far far less entertaining than the day before but only one team was trying to win it. The other was trying to find as many ways to be as thuggish as possible. I said before the tournament I thought Spain or France would take it, so I feel somewhat vindicated, but truth be told, I was leaning towards France. This Spain team will be around for a while though and to think Lamine Yamal is both a Euro winner and World Cup winner before the age of 20 is astonishing. The fact that the entire Argentinian team turned their backs on the trophy presentation speaks volumes about their sporting integrity. Now that the WC is over, will FIFA have the balls to hand out extended bans to some of the players for the 'Malvinas' banner, and to the players sent off yesterday, especially Paredes. One little chuckle - it has to be said - was that after the presentation which the US president had long vowed to stay front and centre of and celebrate with the winners like he did last year at the Club World Cup, was actually how quickly he and the FIFA president in his expensive suit and glossy white trainers moved to the sidelines and got the heck out of there. Having recently called out Spain as bad members of NATO for not allowing them to use airbases in Spain to assist in logistics for the gulf operations, they are on the US s***list and had tariffs increased. He would have partied longer I am sure if Messi had been holding it aloft! All in all, I think we have worthy winners of a mediocre world cup. The stars of the show for me were teams like Cabo Verde who raised their game like ICT did when we went ballistic, and for fans who mixed and mingled without segregation in most stadia. Special mention of course to the Tartan Army but also to the Norwegians and pretty much anyone else who came to the events with the right intentions. Here in Toronto, we saw impressive marches to the matches at Toronto Stadium, by Croatia (twice), Portugal, Germany, Morocco and others but for me, the Mexicans took the cake. There was no live Mexican match here of course, and the FanFest had to shutdown abruptly in the middle of the opening game being broadcast on the big screen from Mexico due to thunder and lightning ... but undeterred, for their game against England the fans marched from the CN tower to the FanFest, which is a good couple of miles just to watch the game on the big screen. Luckily no weather issues this time, but unluckily, no result for them :( Oh well, now to look ahead to Euro 2028 in the UK, and WC 2030 in Spain, Portugal, Morocco. 64 teams anyone?

I went into this game wanting neither team to win but after the first 20 minutes, I actually wanted England to edge it. (Then Spain to gub them in the final). Not a big fan of the Argentinians, and my Chilean and Brazilian colleagues tell me the feelings in South America are similar towards them. The politicisation of the Falklands at the end of the game, and the previous - alleged racism - issue when they played Egypt make them unsupportable for me. ¡Buena suerte a España el domingo! (Good luck to Spain on Sunday)

Maybe a 'superhero' that's more local? She has made a bob or two in Hollywood, and will hopefully be set for life for income from appearances at ComiCon or similar etc after both Dr Who, as well as Guardians of the Galaxy and Avengers appearances, not to mention Jumanji and the forthcoming Highlander remake. She likely has a few friends in the business with pots of cash but more importantly seems to value her Scottish and Highland roots and is a big supporter of Mikeys Line as well.... ... and she likes football VideoPresskaren-gillan-leads-scotland-celebrations-after-world-cup-...Hollywood actress Karen Gillan was filmed singing and dancing with Scotland fans after their World Cup win over Haiti - her celebration video was viewed over 4.8 million times online.

finishing anywhere above 9th will do for me. Would prefer it to be comfortably above 9th, but consolidation this season is the key.

The point i am making - as BC seems confused on my earlier post - is that Balogun's card being suspended (which it should not have been once the decision was made) has made a mockery of every other red card whether it was deserved (like Quansah's), or whether it was deemed worthy of a review. This precedent (or should it be president) now gives anyone the ability to question almost any card and ask for it to be suspended rather than automatically applied and that is fundamentally wrong. The ref calls the red card, and at this level it goes to VAR. It's not 100% perfect, but it's what we have. It is upheld or overturned on the field. Decision made. End of story. Player knows he is out for the next game at a minimum. In the following days the disciplinary committee can look at it and determine the ref got it right or wrong. Again, not a perfect system, but it's what we have. They can choose to increase the automatic 1 game suspension (as they did with Quansah), or they drop it back to a yellow if they feel the ref got it wrong (which they didn't do in either case). However, the act of suspending a card is unheard of and let's be honest, was it on anyone's radar until this happened? Personally, I have never heard of this happening before at almost any level. Even the 1962 card for Garrincha, which is the only other example cited in almost 200 World Cup red cards, was not suspended, a ban was simply not imposed. At that time, there was no automatic suspension like there is now, but a disciplinary committee chose to issue a warning rather than a match suspension after alleged pressure from the country leaders of each team in the match. [full story here and its quite interesting: https://fansided.com/soccer/bribery-secret-calls-and-a-vanishing-witness-inside-world-cup-red-card-fifa-actually-reversed].

... and now the England player got an additional game ban. His studs up challenge WAS deserving of a red card, and possibly even the additional game, but with the Balogun situation, it's just made a nonsense of things. Not able to appeal either.

Just for the record, it was Belgian waffles this morning :) Draw a line, move on. It will forever be in the history books and with UEFA going after Infantino before the tournament and now (quite rightly) issuing that statement in support of Belgium before last night's game, the current head of FIFA's days may be numbered. You know it is bad when even Blatter is saying it was a bad decision. England should NOT appeal the red card. You are right to say this sets precedent, but they should take the moral high ground. If it were Kane or Bellingham perhaps they might think about it but with all due respect to Quansah, his studs up challenge is not the hill to die on for this question unless they want to be as reviled as the USA team yesterday.

Its a miss on this one for me I think. I like the neckline as I hate round neck shirts so anything that is V neck or polo style works for me but thats the only positives. I can't see why we chose the colour. My first thought (other than Wolves too) was that it was like a Motherwell top that's been washed 1000 times and faded. Like/agree with the idea of having the away strip being some combo of our traditional colours of red/black/blue/white that is not in use in whatever design we use for the home strip that year. Loved the 30 year strip but the reality is that most people did not get to order it as there was a miniscule run and not in all sizes. Would happily order this if we brought it back

Thank you Belgium

That would be the simplest and most classy solution from the manager. Plenty could question the manager's choice but no-one can supersede it!

Hate to say it but think England deserved that result. They were the better team, Bellingham was on fire, and I also thought Harry Kane was a little hard done by at their penalty. Now we are all Vikings for the next round :) agreed. FIFA will likely hide behind the 'right call' quote I mentioned earlier, but it's not like they even rescinded it, they suspended the suspension (whatever that means) so that the player can take the field against Belgium.

Yup. Same ref, I think and same terrible performance.

Cabo Verde are the real heroes of this tournament so far. Wow. You could see how nervous all the Argentine supporters were at the end. They threw everything at them in this game, just like they did in their earlier games. Definitely a side that can hold their heads up high as they head home.

Referee is pretty bad also. Interesting that Australia replaced keeper just before the end of ET. Ryan is apparently a better penalty stopper than the starting keeper. We shall see in the shootout. Winner to face Argentina or Cape Verde ... both of whom would likely win against them on today's performance. edit: didnt work for them, Egypt through on pens.

Don't blame me for the VAR! ☹️ It certainly affected the game here in Toronto last night! Setting aside the VAR controversy, this game was the dream game for much of Toronto when people started working out the potential matchups for this fixture. There is a huge population of both Portuguese and Croatian descent in and around the Toronto area and from (Portuguese) drivers literally shutting down the highways to get a glimpse of the team bus heading from the airport to downtown, mobbing the team hotel (before and after the game) and the respective marches to the game from each set of supporters it was something pretty damn awesome! This kind of has a bit of everything ion the feed: https://www.ctvnews.ca/toronto/article/portugal-advances-to-world-cup-round-of-16-with-2-1-over-croatia-in-final-match-at-toronto-stadium-live-updates-here/ Absolutely, although, as you can tell, I prefer a good waffle with my maple syrup! Watching TFC is a roller-coaster of emotions and frustrations, and is, in many ways similar to supporting ICT but with added money (which they don't seem to use very well)! 100% - always long for that on my trips home. You just can't beat the heavily blackened top of what was once an edible pie, and waiting until 10 minutes into the second half to get it :) I do have to say though I am somewhat surprised that the SFA have not banned it as the top crust might be usable as a Scottish Ninja Star It's worse than that .... its Dingwall for you, my friend.

end of the day I am not a fan of betting logos on shirts, and I know we have previously turned down offers to sponsor this website from betting companies with one single exception. We did take on an offer from one firm to sponsor our betting forum for a short time based on the "offer being too good to refuse" and maybe that's the situation the club find itself in as they continue to rebuild from the brink of extinction. I would rather this type of gamble than the gambles the previous regime took!

It was noted on the commentary last night that FIFA has responded to North American media queries regarding the "clear and obvious" definition and received a response that it is "not the decision that we are aiming to reach". The decision we are looking for is based on "was it the correct call?". Overall, I think most of the VAR has been decent in this World Cup because its setup to be quick with semi-automated offside checks and other calls happening in seconds (so quick in some cases we may not even be aware it happened). I also like the quick check for a corner or goal kick and the speeding up of substitutions/throw-ins and goalkeeper throw/kick outs .... Unfortunately, however these positive tweaks will not trickle down as they are mostly "optional" and most leagues could not afford the costs that FIFA are throwing at the technology for this World Cup. I don't like it when it takes 2-3 minutes of studying the footage from all angles as that is - by definition - not clear and obvious, but as FIFA noted, that's not the benchmark they are using ... But by saying that it then opens up a whole different can of worms. As with VAR everywhere else, it is only as good as the officials behind the scenes and on the pitch and as others have said, that varies wildly in terms of consistency. If you are now saying the question is "Was this the correct call?" then you can look at so many incidents and ask that question. Even yesterday, that means Kane should have been booked for diving before saving their skins, and perhaps it is likely that Balogun would not have been red carded, and the USA penalty would not have been awarded - but that's all subjective. And let's not even go there on the inconsistencies in the Scotland Morocco game with the Uzbekistan ref and the worst MLS ref in the VAR booth!

cant find the article but think the reverse happened to us recently with a couple of youth players .. they switched allegiance away from Scotland after scoring bucketloads of goals in the youth setup. Unfortunately, a more likely situation given our current (and historical) malaise. Nevertheless: Always hopeful, Always disappointed, but Always Scotland.

There were moments for Canada, but your assessment is pretty accurate. Oluwaseyi is not first choice striker. It should be Jonathan David and/or Cyle Larin. JD and CL have 74 goals between them in 174 combined appearances. Much like Scotland however, the striker depth chart is pretty weak ... recent call-ups included former ICT player Aribim Pepple. What Canada had that Scotland didn't (other than an easier group) however was team spirit and effort. Perhaps I am being a little disingenuous, but too many Scotland players seemed less than interested, jaded after a long season, or simply didn't perform. For Canada, they may not have the skill of the bigger nations, and for sure I think Netherlands or Morocco may put an end to their journey, but in most of their games they battled for every ball. Manager Jesse Marsch got a lot of criticism south of the border for encouraging his guys to keep going when they were playing Qatar and it was 5-0, then 6-0. He wanted them to compete to the very end and score 7, 8, or 9 if they could. These players would crawl over broken glass to play for him and for their country and that's how we used to be. Heck, look at all the others who overtook us in the hunt for a last 32 slot and almost every one of them took their last game by the scruff of the neck and left nothing out there on the pitch at the end of their respective games. We did not. Going back to the Canada game, one thing I did notice was that as soon as Alphonso Davies came on in the 75th minute, that lifted Canada immensely and the remaining 15 minutes were spent pretty much camped out in the South African half. He had some nice touches and his presence, even not fully fit gave a lift and some extra energy to all around the team. I think they also knew he only had 20 minutes in him at this stage of his recovery so needed to get it done before it went to extra-time! Not sure if this was broadcast outside Canada, but at the end, the media here of course stayed with the players and coach as they huddled on the pitch, and he gave them a team-talk. He was calling them "Canadian Heroes" which is true as they have gone further than Canada ever has before, and noting that kids will start playing, or become re-invigorated by the game because of how far they have got so far and the feelgood factor around the team. It was a very inspirational talk and very emotional for many of the players (and the manager). If somehow, they can make it past their next opponents, then that would be amazing, but they would need to lift their game, and Davies would also need to be available for longer than 15 minutes. The manager himself described it as a "free hit" and has come in for some flak for saying that, but I think what he meant in the heat of the moment is that qualifying for the last 32 was the (realistic) goal, and getting to the last 16 or any further is totally and utterly a bonus and most Canadian fans will agree with that realistic assessment - even if hoping for a bit of luck and far more :)