Scotty

Maybe Marsella is scouting himself .......

click site rules at bottom of page to see, and to answer the other question, yes.

everyone does ... you can see your own warning level, but not anyone else's .... if it says zero, then you are a good boy (for now)

This got me thinking ..... We get asked this every so often, and there are a couple of things we could do to facilitate this kind of thing first - I have re-installed an old feature we used to have called 'member map' ..... you can find it in the features menu - add your location and maybe over time, other users in nearby locations will add theirs so you will know if someone lives nearby. It is a free add-on for the board so no big deal. The second option is actually a paid option (costs about $50 to purchase) but allows for the creation of various groups .... be that supporter groups in different areas, or maybe other groups we have but dont really realise such as Highland Marchers, Exiles or Ex- Pats, or even the younger lads in the North Stand ..... we are not going to purchase it if no-one would use it, but would give it consideration of there is a niche for it here ..... details of the app are here: http://community.invisionpower.com/files/file/4226-rsyvarth-social-groups/

Ach Scarlet, come back to me when your team has the 2 highest official travelling support records in MLS !!!! 5000 fans --> 338 miles to Montreal this year 2500 fans --> 427 miles, across the border to Columbus, Ohio in 2009

and now ICT are a fine, family orientated, straight laced, inoffensive football club that has become a feckin institution in just 18 seasons .....

As a former Caley fan, I would have to respectfully disagree !!! to an extent ..... We will never know for sure, and to me it is a largely irrelevant scenario as we are now ICT, but my belief is that if Caley had applied individually, we may not have got in initially, and may have had to wait until about the time Gretna got in. Even if we had got in on our own in '94, I think the progress would have been quite a bit slower, and at best we would have emulated County rather than ICT in taking a longer time to reach the top league. I have no doubt that Caley would have reached the SPL, but we would have spent a few additional seasons bouncing around the 1st and/or 2nd divisions, and staying in the top flight may or may not have been sustainable. My reasoning? simple. The early years of ICT is peppered with people from both the former Caley and Thistle camps (be it supporters or officials) who have business know-how & football savvy that helped us develop, and very importantly, some folk with extremely good contacts with the old boys network that was deciding who would get in ..... for example ... we should not underestimate the influence of the likes of former Thistle Chairman Jock MacDonald in getting us in in the first place, or David Sutherland who was also a Thistle supporter in steadying our finances, ploughing money in for stands, and generally putting practices in place that sees us now crowing about how efficiently run we are in another thread ...... without them we may have been successful, or we may not .... we will never know for sure.

Signing ban was imposed a few days ago when they failed to pay their players. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/22909435

Photos from that game ......

From the SFA registration rules ..... 12.2.7 A Player may be registered on a Recreational Form for more than one Club subject always to the rules and regulations of the relevant Affiliated National Association where applicable and these Procedures. 12.3 Eligibility to Play 12.3.1 A Player who is registered upon a Recreational Form may only play for the Club(s) for which he is registered provided that to do so is not contrary to these Procedures and the rules and regulations, as appropriate of the Scottish Amateur FA, Scottish Welfare FA, Scottish Women’s FA, Scottish Youth FA and Scottish Schools FA. Used to get this a few times back in my days on the committee of the IDAFA .... we had professional or semi-pros coming back to the amateurs after retiring from HFL or SFL and that was a paperwork minefield to get them classified as an amateur again. We also had players who - quite legally - played for more than one team in different associations, and I know some associations used to also allow 'trialists' who could play up to 3 games. Not sure how it all lies now though as the IDAFA broke away from its affiliation to the SAFA years ago when the SAFA were pushing through a raft of unpopular measures, and as far as I know it is now (or was) a directly registered association with the SFA .... bottom line, cant see the player doing anything too dodgy as he would presumably have been on pro or semi-pro forms at ICT, and would then have to jump through hoops to register as an amateur to play in welfare/amateur, and then go back and sign semi-pro forms (or non-recreational I think they are called now) to play in anything from North Caledonian League or above.... and you cant just switch every few months!

League rules limit the amount of "non-domestic" players though Scarlet .... MLS has a total of 152 'international' slots available for the entire league which are spread amongst the 19 teams. For MLS teams in the USA, an international slot is used for any player (including a designated player) who is not an American citizen, a holder of a green card, or who does not have special status (eg. is a refugee or has been previously granted asylum). In Canada, its pretty much the same with the exception that Americans are also classed as domestics and Canadian MLS teams must have a minimum of 3 Canadians in their squad. As each squad has a maximum of 30 players, then that is 152 out of the 570 squad places league wide that are available to non-domestics. Each team started with a 8 slots, but teams can trade the slots as part of normal transfers/trades so Vancouver right now has 11 slots whereas Toronto has 9 ..... its somewhat similar to the old UEFA 3 foreigner rule that disappeared when it was deemed unlawful by the EU.

I never actually knew that! It puts some things into perspective for me now, in a different context. Helpful to know. Not strictly true ..... Northern Ireland has had no officially sanctioned flag since 1972, and since 1973 only the union flag (union jack) is permitted, by law, to be flown on (national) government buildings. (see attachment) The Ulster banner was the official flag from 53-72 but ceased to have status when parliament was dissolved in 72. While it is true to say that it is contentious, given that it is still used by loyalists and flown above some local authority buildings where the council is controlled by loyalists (as the flag law does not cover local councils), it is also used to represent Northern Ireland in sports such as football (look at fifa.com) and the commonwealth games where a distinction between home nations is required. The St Patrick's Saltire has no official status although it is the Northern Irish component of the Union Flag. It tends to be viewed as a cross-community symbol with less political baggage than the Ulster Banner, Irish Tricolour, or Union Flags. It is one of two flags authorised by the Church of Ireland to be flown on buildings, and also forms the basis of the Northern Irish police badge. It is also approved for use in Orange Walks !!!! snpc-04474.pdf

They'd hammer them on FIFA13 !!!!!

I doubt this helped:http://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/News/Ex-ICT-player-accused-of-street-attack-in-Aberdeen-9785.htm In the interests of fairness, if we are going to dredge up the criminal charges he faced, it should also be pointed out that both he and his brother were cleared of those charges: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-10938924 Apparently a lot of the disdain for him comes from the attitude he had at ICT, and may still have at RCFC. Do a search here on CTO and you will find plenty comments from his time at ICT, but for more recent opinion, I give you a County fan posting on the Oldham website before his move there fell through .... http://www.owtb.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=42686&st=80#entry635679

The related link on the page above is funny reading too ... "The wit and wisdom of Kilmarnock boss, Kenny Shiels" : http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/kilmarnock-manager-kenny-shiels-most-1942939 My favourite is: "Celtic make a song and dance about everything, don’t they? Paranoid FC." to which Neil Lennon replied "he’s the David Brent of Scottish football" :lol:

I like.

Yup, thats the one for me too ... especially as the Seethe makes a cameo appearance

The highlight reel and TV show maybe helped him get to this point, but what he does from here is up to him ..... I am happy enough to trust in TB and his backroom team when it comes to recognising potential, realising that potential is always up to the player

I spat out my coffee reading this comment !!! hot coffee burns the nostrils. thanks Charles, a classic line from you Lets just say that even those trying to retain anonymity do leave a footprint behind. However, the data protection act would prevent me from saying anything more if i could be bothered checking into that suggestion .....

Have you got those figures to hand? Would make interesting reading. not always, but yes, they did have higher averages than ICT for 8 of the 10 seasons where both were in the same league. The first couple of seasons were within a couple of hundred or so and very likely effects of the merger on the ICT side coupled with some Jaggies who would not go to Telford street. By the time we moved into TCS and won the 3rd div in 96/97 we were well above them and the following year, both teams saw their average drop considerably (because of no derbies presumably). From 2000 to 2004 County were well above ICT in attendance average, but that also coincided with the famous (infamous) jokes about the very real padding of the figures by counting season ticket holders who had not actually entered the ground on any given match day. ICT obviously got a bump entering the SPL and some of that carried through when we were relegated as we had 1000 more than County, and this season, County were about 400 above us, but remember, they had 3 games against Celtic at home in the 6K range and we only had 2, plus you have to consider the anticipated SPL 'bump' so it will be interesting to see how it pans out next season when both of these top six teams battle it out 94/95 RCFC = 1566, ICT = 1276 both in SFL3 95/96 RCFC = 1749, ICT = 1579 both in SFL3 96/97 RCFC = 1789, ICT = 2495 both in SFL3 97/98 RCFC = 1330, ICT = 1762 RC in SFL3, ICT in SFL2 98/99 RCFC = 1643, ICT = 2119 RC in SFL3, ICT in SFL2 99/00 RCFC = 2293, ICT = 2282 both in SFL2 00/01 RCFC = 2789, ICT = 2133 both in SFL1 01/02 RCFC = 2757, ICT = 2045 both in SFL1 02/03 RCFC = 2678, ICT = 2181 both in SFL1 03/04 RCFC = 3203, ICT = 2374 both in SFL1 04/05 RCFC = 2336, ICT = 4067 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 05/06 RCFC = 2302, ICT = 5061 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 06/07 RCFC = 2344, ICT = 4814 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 07/08 RCFC = 2246, ICT = 4753 RC in SFL2, ICT in SPL 08/09 RCFC = 2225, ICT = 4457 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 09/10 RCFC = 2465, ICT = 3509 both in SFL1 10/11 RCFC = 2358, ICT = 4526 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 11/12 RCFC = 2745, ICT = 4023 RC in SFL1, ICT in SPL 12/13 RCFC = 4429, ICT = 4038 both in SPL

experienced a couple of those wild days .... there's quite a few stories from back then. Dont think he is quite the player now that he once was though - still got the skill, but plays a more central role and gets others to do the running !!!

Ach, IHE is pasta his best as for Dani ... hope he scores on his debut, otherwise while his scoring tally stays at naan, his new team will be waiting a while for him to poppadam goal in.

We didnt start this award until 2000/01 season ..... wonder who we would have added if we had done this from the very first season .... Here's the officially recognised awards from each season .. for some reason I dont have last year (other than our own)

with Liam Keogh and Jonny Hayes as subs ..... It hadnt registered with me that we have had enough players in different positions who have won it to make a full team without any of them really looking out of place positionally .... these awards (in general) tend to go to 'glory' players like attacking mids or strikers so happy to see the CTO membership over the years is discerning enough to recognise great talent in whatever position it plays

Many of those players will simply re-sign with their current clubs, they are just technically out of contract. Flood, McFadden and Higdon are obvious names most of us might like to see at ICT, but doubt any of them will head this way. There was talk of Paddy McCourt coming to MLS, but not sure how serious that was or whether it originated in some fan forum somewhere and just grew arms and legs. I could also see Rory Fallon heading this side of the pond, perhaps even to Toronto given that former New Zealand captain Ryan Nelson is manager here and Fallon is also a New Zealand international. We currently have his fellow NZ striker Jeremy Brockie on loan for a few months as cover for Robert Earnshaw and until Danny Koevermans is back to full fitness, but he is going back to A League in July/Aug so a spot might open up. Was watching Canada / Costa Rica friendly the other day and it also seems Hainault is not sure of his future at County. He was interviewed and it did not sound like he has been offered anything (yet). Was talking about finding a club ..... not one for us, but interesting that County seem to have blanked a few players towards the end of the season ... Didnt Vigurs also say something about being offered nothing yet !