Scotty

see post 163 and/or front page of this site :025: and interestingly no denial or confirmation of comments that ICT wanted the game on but he was not too bothered (allegedly). If he was so concerned for his team's fans, many of whom would be well up the road by 11:30 perhaps he could have added weight to the call for a pitch inspection an hour later and the ref may have considered it !!!!! All in all its a mess and ICT and QOS bickering does no-one any good .... maybe the SFL or the SFA should look seriously at the issue as a whole and put some form of robust policy in place since virtually every team has been in the situation of having fans half way (or further) to a game when its called off ... we were even 28 minutes into a game once when it was called off :025:

and then of course you get stories like this that muddy the water: http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,12874_3864254,00.html could some of this be instigation? http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11095_3810129,00.html or maybe not http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11095_3693946,00.html or maybe this was the first mistake? http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/t..._ct/7364125.stm or http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/t..._ct/7354271.stm

The overnight temperature on Thursday night was below the effective range of the USH, switching it on earlier would have had very little if any effect other than costing money. USH is not a magic cure all for wintry weather and hard pitches, it has optimum operating conditions too and once you go outside those conditions you dont get the expected result ! Presumably that is one of the reasons why ICT club officials lobbied the ref hard on Saturday to do a further pitch inspection an hour later .... they wanted the game on and felt the extra hour would have meant the pitch was playable. The referee declined. It is not the club's decision to call the game off, the referee makes that decision, and in this case did so despite the protestations of one of the two clubs involved. I know its easy to blame ICT for absolutely everything that happens at the TCS and some people are very good at that, myself included (when I feel it is justified), but FFS, they cannot be to blame for weather and the decision of a third party with no connection to the club other than the fact that he will be working on their property* for 90 minutes that day !!!! [* - i know, different debate, stadium ownership etc !!!]

now that is customer service !!! well done to the 'ladies' :025: :025: (although I hope the mug was washed before you got it)

Until or unless it is proved otherwise, Marius holds all the cards and is due any and all outstanding fees as per the terms of his contract, be that signing on fees, a cut of the transfer fee when he left us, or anything else that was in the paperwork. Admittedly, there are those on here who are pro-Marius (we all know Stevico's connection for example) but of all the information that has come out in the public domain so far - and I will concede that most of it has come from Marius' side - it has done nothing but support his argument. The fact that FIFA also backed him further supports his contention. At the end of the day I believe it will all come down to "what constitutes instigation?" and who did it first. Did our major shareholder and Director of Football instigate proceedings by coming out before the Euros and (naively) stating that we may not be able to hold onto him due to finances, effectively putting him in the shop window (and alerting clubs he could be had for a knockdown price) or did Marius instigate it after the Euros by choosing to go to Dinamo rather than perhaps going to another club who made a more lucrative offer to ICT? Obviously, both sides think they are in the right, and most of us have an opinion one way or another, but the sad thing is that is has had to go this far and regardless of the outcome will leave a bitter taste and a hole in the wallets of many (except the lawyers).

injuries perhaps? We know Lilley was out but perhaps there were one or two more who were doubtful that we were not aware of (especially on a 'hard' pitch)? All I am saying, as witnessed by a number of people who started to arrive at the ground either to work or to cover the game for the media, is that the QOS boss did not appear to be that perturbed that the game was called off after the inspection. In fact, he appeared to be dead set against the ICT suggestion of waiting for a further inspection closer to kick-off when the game might realistically have gone ahead. The 'real' reason for his stance is perhaps only known to Mr Chisholm but to come out on the QOS website and spout an opinion that was diametrically opposite to his actions is complete bullshit. We are great at blaming ICT for things, and they give us no end of opportunities to do so but on this one they are not at fault and the crap spouted by Chic Young and then Gordon Chisolm is unwarranted and unprofessional.

Indeed, I hadnt updated it since the end of last season ...... compared to last season, wins are up, draws and losses are down so I would say his stats are looking good. He inherited a team doing badly, ultimately couldnt save us from relegation but has slowly but surely improved our stats over the season. HOWEVER - it is NOT championship winning numbers YET ..... see second screenshot for Robbo's stats from 03/04

So to summarise the facts and rumours ........ Thursday - Tommy says turn on the heating, it is not done and the club save a few quid. I find this plausible but bottom line, in the SFL the club are not obliged to have or use USH. Friday - It has been really cold overnight, in fact so cold that the decision to not turn on the USH has proved to be the correct one as at such a low temperature it would have had little or no effect and would have been tantamount to sitting in the centre circle setting fire to a bunch of tenners ! However, feeling how cold it is now, the chairman (board?) decide to have the USH switched on between now and kick-off more than 27 hours later (at an average cot of ?80 p/hour that is just over ?2.1K). By late afternoon, the groundsman (Tommy), acknowledged as one of the best in the country, says its starting to look like it may be playable barring any more severe weather. The heating is left on. Saturday - The heating has been on all night but with a surface temperature of -2 all of the frost is not going away and the ground is still hard. A 9AM inspection does not take place due to a communication issue between SFL, match referee and a local referee but the 11:30 inspection by match referee does take place. After a long inspection, he reluctantly calls the game off. At this time it is alleged that QOS were not too concerned at all, but that ICT, the groundsman, and the manager were confident the game would be able to go ahead if the ref agreed to a further inspection an hour later. That request was denied. game off. Saturday - aftermath - Chic Young spouts a load of guff on RS to try and stir the pot, blows enough hot air in fact that it would have made the pitch playable in just a few minutes if he had been brought in to commentate. His esteemed colleague Mr Bannerman, who had been onsite since prior to the pitch inspection refutes many if not all of his allegations in a posting on here. The QOS manager who has been witnessed to have not been concerned at the call off, in fact some might say even 'welcoming' of it also starts trying to make himself look good in the eyes of his own fans by blaming ICT for not doing enough to make it go ahead on QOS websites. Monday - ICT issue a press release questioning the comments of the QOS manager. bottom line, we turned up the heating, we didnt have to. The pitch was perfect by 3pm but the ref wouldnt wait past 11:30 to call the game off ..... short of turning the heating on a day earlier (which at -8 overnight would have had no effect) we are not at fault for this. Gordon Chisholm can blame who he likes but his blustering comments to curry favour with his own fans are worthy of a Jimmy Calderwwod mind game award and contrary to the actions witnessed by many on the day of the game.

Darren sent the release to me, as he has done with all previous releases (not that ICT issue many to be honest and two in one day is almost unheard of :021:) so I have passed on the positive comments made so far about the fact that information has been issued at all !!!! No idea how this debate will develop - probably much like all of the other Niculae debates - but as has been pointed out already, the mere fact that ICT have issued a press release is actually a step forward !!!!

If we are using "standard SPL contracts" as has been trotted out regarding Mr Niculae, then I find it strange to think that the SPL would not include a relegation clause in that standard contract as one of their members should succumb to that fate every season. Having said that, with regards to wages, and I will concede that I have no clue on the actual numbers, but are we really paying considerably more now than we were previously? We have always been touted as the team that paid the smallest wages in the SPL and even in the 1st last time round we just sat on or about the "average". I know there are probably notable exceptions to this rule - Niculae was paid a bit more (but not as excessively as we were led to believe by some) and Barrowman was picking up what could be termed a ridiculous wage in respect to his contribution to the cause - but most are now gone. I cant really see Rossco, Granty or others picking up a huge wage?

Irrespective of the subject matter, be it Niculae, Stadium ownership, perceived financial problems or anything else that gets debated on here, one of the biggest bug-bears of the support is the lack of communication between club and fans so yes, personally I welcome this kind of thing with open arms and as we have told the club time and time again, we will always publish press releases and any accompanying story regardless of where we sit in terms of our opinion on the matter.

we used to get them in the past, had a lull when we had a chief executive but get them again now that Darren is in charge.

The club have asked us to publish a press release regarding their appeal over the FIFA Niculae decision. It can be found here: http://caleythistleonline.com/news/footbal...iculae-decision

Really ? http://www.qosfc.com/HeadlineNews/ViewFull...36/Default.aspx Really: http://caleythistleonline.com/news/footbal...s-press-release I too have heard the story - and not from CaleyD - that the QOS manager was allegedly none too concerned at the game being called off, it was Mr Butcher and ICT officials who were trying like blazes to get it played. For once, I believe our board and our club as the same information trickled across to me from several independent - and reliable - sources throughout the course of Saturday.

not beyond the realms of possibility: http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scotsol/ho...relegation.html

bonfires .... great idea and have Tommy in charge of the one at the centre circle that has the effigy of CaleyD on the top of it :(

Turn it round ..... If this was an away game, would you be happy if you were making your way down to Palmerston and found out as you passed Glasgow that the game was off, or would you be more relieved to find out as you passed Aviemore so your day wasnt totally f***** ! You have to consider everything, including the travelling support. Because the club is trying to pick and choose when they want to play teams. The club tookages to agree when the county game was going to be played. I am with Jaggie1994 on this one ... not everything has to be a conspiracy. There is no reason to try and get out of today's game other than it quite simply succumbing to "natural causes", to suggest anything else is IMHO ludicrous. Furthermore, we are not trying to pick and choose when we play other teams. As we didnt proactively go to the SFL with pre-agreed dates for our postponed games, I am not sure we had any say in the dates the SFL issued for the re-arranged fixtures .......

We had a couple of enquiries about this but for one reason or another the users were unable to take up the offer so this slot is still available fo anyone who is interested.

I think there is a club that already did/do that but cant remember who and how successfull it was ..... certainly an idea if there is no viable sponsor who comes in with enoug spondoolachs to tempt us.

as of 5pm tonight, no mention of a pitch inspection at the TCS so maybe QOS website was wrong and ours was right : source: www.scottishfootballleague.com

yes, we are still contracted to Errea. I would love Adidas as the quality (of their Toronto FC shirts at least) is excellent, but we have Errea for a while yet so no point in dreaming

The SAFA are way harder on the amateurs than the SFA are on the professionals. 2 years for a potential wrongful dismissal and 5 cases of dissent .... I have seen more lenient penalties given out for actual physical contact or intimidation of a ref !!! I was on the committee of the Inverness A.F.A. for a few years and we heard some right horror stories from 'down the road' and handed out a few lengthy bans and fines ourselves (cant remember any of that length though) .... the problem was that if you were too lenient with certain offences, the SAFA would send the decision back to you and tell you to make it harsher ! They (SAFA) also introduced a set of guidelines just as I was coming to the end of my time on the committee that specified minimum bans for certain offences and these were OTT. Whats more, your discipline record over the last 3 years also had to be taken into account and each time you were reported by a ref your ban more or less doubled .... 2 weeks, 4 weeks, 8 weeks, 16 weeks etc ..... Hugh Knapp has always been good at spin though ..... "Mr Cooper was given the opportunity to attend a hearing but decided not to" ..... in other words, you wanted him to miss work, travel the breadth of the country at an inconvenient time, and find out what his punishment was going to be .... there is no arguing your case at these things, the referees report is cast in stone and cannot be questioned as far as the SAFA are concerned, and based on that report, the decision is already made in most cases. If you attend you are basically just there to hear your sentence in person "He was also given the opportunity to appeal to the Scottish Football Association and again chose not to do that so the matter is closed" .... What Mr Knapp does not mention is that it costs you an absolute fortune to convene a hearing for the appeal and you only get part of that back if you win (which is rare) !

as we now have a new strip thread running, can we narrow this topic to Flybe's sponsorship please and keep all temptation to post new strips to the new thread. cheers

just a quick point to note for Prediction League players (thats the SFL prediction league rather than Gringo's NPL) - these fixtures have all been amended in the SFL-PL so you can now go in and enter predictions or amend existing ones. For those who like to leave it to the last minute, you may also want to go to wk28 and predict the County score as that match has been brought forward by 11 days.

UPDATED LIST as per the SFL website link posted above WK18 - 19 Dec 2009 Ayr Utd -v- Partick Th Wed Mar 10th 7:45pm WK18 - 19 Dec 2009 QOS -v- Raith Rovers Tue Mar 16th 7:45pm WK19 - 26 Dec 2009 Airdrie Utd -v- Dunfermline Tue Mar 9th 7:45pm WK19 - 26 Dec 2009 Morton -v- Ayr Utd Tue Mar 30th 7:30pm WK19 - 26 Dec 2009 Raith Rovers -v- Ross County Tue Mar 9th 7:45pm WK20 - 02 Jan 2010 Inverness CT -v- Ross County Tue Mar 30th 7:45pm WK20 - 02 Jan 2010 Dunfermline -v- Raith Rovers Tue Mar 2nd 7:45pm WK21 - 16 Jan 2010 Ayr Utd -v- Airdrie Utd Tue Mar 2nd 7:45pm WK21 - 16 Jan 2010 Morton -v- Inverness CT Tue Mar 2nd 7:30pm WK21 - 16 Jan 2010 Ross County -v- QOS Tue Apr 6th 7:45pm WK23 - 30 Jan 2010 Ayr Utd -v- Raith Rovers Wed Apr 7th 7:45pm WK23 - 30 Jan 2010 Dunfermline -v- QOS Sat Mar 13th 3:00pm WK23 - 30 Jan 2010 Morton -v- Airdrie Utd Tue Mar 16th 7:30pm WK24 - 13 Feb 2010 Ayr Utd -v- Dundee Wed Mar 17th 7:45pm WK28 - 13 Mar 2010 Dunfermline -v- Dundee Tue Mar 30th 7:45pm WK28 - 13 Mar 2010 QOS -v- Ross County Tue Mar 2nd 7:45pm WK28 - 13 Mar 2010 Partick -v- Raith Rovers Tue Mar 30th 7:30pm WK29 - 20 Mar 2010 Airdrie Utd -v- Dundee Sat Mar 20th 3:00pm (was originally scheduled as Dundee -V- Airdrie Utd but they switched the fixture on 3rd Jan to Dens so this is the corresponding fixture switched-back) 1 point to note !!! - Morton game is a 7-30PM kick-off NOT a 7-45PM KO