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It takes quite a few people (and resources) behind the scenes to keep the site running smoothly and every year we do look to see if anyone is interested in helping out in some way. From a technical standpoint, I am always looking for bugs to squash and improvements to make so that the site runs as quickly as possible and without error. I am always interested in people with technical skills who can make suggestions or tweak things here and there... and I am still on the lookout for someone with PHP/MySQL knowledge that can help us migrate our current stats application to a late version of PHP7 or to PHP8 which the main site is now running on. That's a bit outside my current capabilities and at some point it means a portion of the site may no longer work if I am unable to get it updated somehow. On the content front the @tm4tj can never have enough assistance. We do have things like the NAPS competition ably managed by @MrCaleyjag or the NPL Prediction league and the SPFL prediction leagues run by @Gringo but Manfer is always looking for help with previews, reports and other articles. There is a small core group of users who help out but there is always room for more. This could be previews, reports, other unrelated articles, blogs, or simply data entry or looking after things like our calendar, player profiles or other history bits and bobs which I know interest a lot of folk if the 'ex-ICT' threads are anything to go by. If you are interested in helping out, and will be able to do any of the stuff listed above ... or have other ideas how you could help, then let us know. Reach out to myself or @tm4tj through email or on here and we can have a chat about it.

Whats more surprising to me - and making me feel old - is that he is now 35 !!

2/3 of our way to sponsoring Cameron's Home top again... bumping this up to bring it back to top and to seek 10 more subscriptions to ensure we can do it. Subscriptions correct up to timestamp of this post.

I guess its easier the further you are away !! Other than those trips where we had to come at short notice, or on specific dates for some reason, it would definitely be true to say I keep one eye on the fixture list when planning a trip. We like to travel midweek-midweek where possible as the costs are generally quite a bit cheaper and the planes are less full. However, there have been a few occasions where we have missed games because they were moved to after our planned leaving date, or we have had to scramble because they were moved forward. More than once I have done the routine of flying overnight intending to sleep but getting none, arriving in Glasgow or Edinburgh at 6 or 7am, driving up the road absolutely knackered (usually have a nap and then a triple espresso at Stirling services), then heading over to the stadium for a night game! Brutal but fun 🙂

oh me of little faith... first time in a while I have predicted a defeat for us in the NPL and we seem to be doing ok! Glad to be utterly wrong.

Pledged/Paid List @Scotty @TheMantis @TheMantis @Shoot @tm4tj @tm4tj @snorbens_caleyman @snorbens_caleyman @scottishhighlands @weeman @TheCaleyOne @IBM @IBM @bughtmaster @Wanderer @HawkeyeTheGnu @HawkeyeTheGnu @HawkeyeTheGnu @Tree @ICT29 @Gringo @Gringo @dumpmaster @dumpmaster @jagster @Gowans @MrCaleyjag @The_Sponge @The_Sponge @The_Sponge ----------------------- @Fraz @Fraz @Robert @Robert @Robert @Moogthurso @Moogthurso @Moogthurso @Moogthurso @Moogthurso @standbydave @roarer --------------------------

Its time for Player Sponsorship for the 2022/2023 season. For 20+ years now we have sponsored one or more ICT players each season. We were proud to have been the main shirt sponsor of Grant Munro through his entire ICT career from a youth breaking into the team to his final season with the club, then we moved onto sponsorship of Liam Polworth. We have also sponsored other players over the years for boots, gloves or other items including record appearance holder Ross Tokely. For the last four seasons we have sponsored Cameron Harper and it looks like a good choice now that he's breaking into both the Caley Thistle side on a regular basis and also got a call-up to the Scotland U21 setup alongside Robbie Deas, Roddy MacGregor and former team-mate Daniel Mackay over the last couple of years. As we continue to transition out of COVID restrictions, the club needs these sponsorships more than ever so here is hoping we can raise enough again this year to continue... Last year our generous site users committed enough so that in addition to Cammy's shirt we were also able to sponsor Lewis Hyde's shirt and it was good to see him break into the first team as the season progressed. He did not look out of place in the first-team and its always a great pride when youngsters we sponsor break through. We will aim to sponsor Cammy first, but if we once again raise enough then we can look to renew other sponsorships. (INITIAL) PLAYER TO BE SPONSORED: We hope to continue sponsorship of CAMERON HARPER's Home Top. If we reach additional milestones, we will look to add sponsorship for other players for 'lesser' items. COST Home Shirt - £450 inc vat [to be confirmed] HOW TO TAKE PART To take part in this sponsorship you will need to upgrade your site membership and join the "Player Sponsor" group. We in turn will use the money received from these memberships (minus PayPal fees) to purchase player sponsorship(s) from the club. We will set all memberships - regardless of when ordered - to end on June 1st of each year. This allows us time each year to gauge the interest in continuing for the following season. The cost to join this group is £16.00 (this amounts to £15.00 joining fee plus £1 to cover the PayPal fees). You may purchase multiple memberships if you wish, just amend the total in your shopping cart and add a note when placing the order if it is to cover family members who may not officially be site members!!! ALL MEMBERS: To join the group simply go to this page http://caleythistleonline.com/store/ or access the CTO Store from the main menu at the top (under shop). All our site membership upgrades are handled securely via PayPal's platform which will accept direct payment from most credit/debit cards so it should be easy enough to upgrade your membership whether you live in Sneck or somewhere thousands of miles from there. CASH MEMBERSHIPS: We do NOT take cash payments. Everything needs to go through Paypal. Sorry. Once we know how many members have joined the group, we will decide on what gets sponsored. The first item will be the selected player's Home Kit ... but the more members who upgrade to "Player Sponsor" membership, the more we can sponsor. At the end of the season, members of our sponsor group will be selected at random to receive any gifts we may receive from the club. For any events that occur during the season (like sponsors nights or meet and greets etc.) we will offer first refusal to members of the sponsor group to attend as our representative. Eligibility will also depend on any COVID restrictions in place at the time. If you are interested, please add your name to this thread or go ahead and join the sponsor group. You will be marked as once we confirm payment received via membership upgrade ....

Ok, just to close the loop on this one... Keith was in touch with me yesterday and the explanation was acceptable and makes sense. In my opinion, it would have been better to give us a quick update at the time, or at the start of playoffs, but I can see how those playoffs and then the players going on break literally the next day could impact things. Good to see they have also acknowledged the lack of 'functions' during the last couple of seasons, and again, with COVID, not entirely within their control... If I have one suggestion for Keith (and anyone else at ICT) it is simply to communicate with us, and by 'us' I mean the broader ICT support whether on here, on social media, via the Trust, in email, podcast, or some other way. Plenty of avenues open to the club and almost all of them biased in the club's favour so no-one is looking to tear them down until they start shooting themselves in the foot! Here is what Keith sent: So we have 3 items to draw for our Player Sponsors and I will get that attended to. Will post the draw info once its done. As in previous years we will use randompicker to do this as the mods/admins are also sponsors. If anyone is interested in going to the event scheduled for August 23rd let me know. It is scheduled for 7pm so may be an issue for those outside of town, but if you are around, and part of our player sponsor group then let me know. if we get more names than are allowed to go then we would do a draw via randopmpicker the same way as for the other goodies 🙂 Finally - based on the response above from Keith then we will try to continue sponsorship for this year and we would likely look to continue Cammy Harper's shirt, then Lewis Hyde away shirt (if we raise enough) . The form the club sent indicates the same cost as last year so £450 inc VAT for a Home shirt and less for lesser items. I will get a thread for this up and running soon. Our costs to site users would also be same as last year which is £16 per membership with users able to purchase multiple memberships if they wish.

The evidence is anecdotal ... players whose careers are affected by this seem to just fade away ... they sign for lower league clubs or slip out of the game with little or no fanfare. Supporters might not notice, or turn around and say they 'found their level' like was said about Rory McCallister, and indeed some of it may be just that, in the same way as you might only get 1 or 2 out of 100 academy kids reaching the first team but burnout does happen. You say Rangers did it - very true, but both them and Celtic cherry pick youngsters from all around the leagues not just their own academy so I would argue the stats there may be skewed. Best example I can think of in world football of burnout like this would be Freddy Adu, but like I said, i see it myself at Toronto over the last two years especially. Luke Singh was - in my opinion - almost ruined by our former boss after being expected to play in the first team every week. He got hung out to dry for a poor performance after 6 or 7 weeks as he wasnt mentally ready to play every week, and his head went down. He was dropped after that last appearance and we havent seen him since. He is now on loan at FC Edmonton in the tier below MLS. Our new boss Bob Bradley has a lot of youngsters in the squad, and although he is trying to manage their minutes more closely, has little alternative but to rely on youth a lot as he rebuilds. That comes with challenges of enthusiastic but inexperienced performances, as well as the risk of burnout. It doesnt take much to shatter a young player's confidence. Bottom line is I am not saying we should not play the youngsters, but lets manage our own expectations. Every player cant be Ryan Christie or Daniel Mackay and we are more likely to see half a dozen who are competent and grow into the role more slowly - or not at all. I was impressed with what I saw of Hyde towards the end of last season so provided we have coaches who will mentor and develop these types players that's fine ... but its not the answer to all our issues or budgets.

We can bring them through, but you have to be careful. There is the adage that if you are good enough, you are old enough, and i loosely agree with that, but its been shown time and again that the vast majority of academy graduates or youth players are neither physically or mentally ready to play every game. Their minutes have to be managed and there needs to be a balance. Otherwise you run the risk of wrecking a career before its even begun. I see the same thing week in and week out at Toronto these days ... There are 11 academy graduates (and several other u-22 players who came from elsewhere) in the 30 man first team squad (currently 27/30 in the squad) and in some games we have seen 6 or more of them start as Bob Bradley rebuilds from the clusterf*** of having Chris Armas as our manager in 2020/21 (the same guy labelled Ted Lasso at Man Utd this year). Players like Ralph Priso, Jahkeele Marshall-Rutty, Jayden Nelson, Kosi Thompson, and Deandre Kerr have all seen significant game time this year and are all under 19. All of them are exciting talents with (just turned 18yo) Jahkeele deemed most likely to perhaps emulate Alphonso Davies who went from Vancouver to Bayern Munich and lit up the Bundesliga. These are players who I would definitely label as "good enough". The others I counted are all under 22 and have also seen a lot of game time simply because of how MLS works ... Bradley cut-out the deadwood late last year and signed some players to replace them, but MLS player and squad rules being what they are you cant do it in one fell swoop regardless of how much money you have (and Toronto are wealthy). Until July 7th Bradley can sign no more players as that's when the transfer window opens in MLS. Lorenzo Insigne has already arrived from Napoli and lots of rumours about other players but the 5 I mentioned above are still likely to see a lot of time on the park. What I have noticed from all of the youngsters, including the 5 teenagers, is that they certainly have the skill, and the athleticism of youth, but in some cases they just cannot physically match up to bigger and older players as they simply haven't fully developed physically yet. They also don't have the guile or experience to draw or get away with fouls or to see a plan or a run from other players in the same way that an older player can and that can lead to needless errors and ultimately heads going down. They will get there, but when the club was going through last season and the first third of this season, and losing a lot of games, the errors got worse and the players form dipped. Last year, you could see it with one particular player who was played a lot and this year he has had to go out on loan to rebuild confidence as it was shattered ... but at least the manager does see potential in him rather than cutting him loose like would and does happen at some clubs ...

How long until we see @IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER wearing it and singing Oh-2-be !!

For some reason I am getting caught up on the use of the word 'bespoke'. Its not bespoke, its off-the-rack, which is the complete opposite. How many people throw that word around to make things sound pretentious and don't bother realising that, when referring to clothes, it means custom tailored, hand made, or at the far end of the definition ...made-to-measure even if those measurements are then entered into a machine to cut the fabric . Cant see anyone tailoring the shirts on the rack for each buyer so its just a shirt! Ok, rant over - as for the shirt itself, kinda like it, even as a Dalneigh boy who went to Telford Street. We were the self-titled Barcelona of the North with the red/blue one, now we are also AC Milan .. so Lionel Messi and Zlatan Ibrahimovich in the next mashup photos of the kit please. Could sell thousands of them online. Now to hope they fixed the wording on the production version of the new home top ...

Crosspost from the Nathan Shaw thread : We will see how he does ... Over the years we have had equal measure of turning jobbers into decent players for us - who then return to being jobbers when they move elsewhere - but we have also signed some out and out duds who never live up to whatever potential someone saw in them. There is a key phrase in that article for me and it is 3 simple words - "reignite his career" . The lad was playing for Celtic as a youngster and had played for Scotland youth before having to drop a couple of leagues after Hamilton so he's clearly not a bad player. However, that fall from the top level has got to hurt a little and of course the head can go down. The article talks about how he wants full time football ... if he wants it enough, then perhaps he is motivated to work hard and achieve it. Give the lad a chance and hopefully it works out for us (and him).

We will see ... Over the years we have had equal measure of turning jobbers into decent players for us - who then return to being jobbers when they move elsewhere - but we have also signed some out and out duds who never live up to whatever potential someone saw in them. There is a key phrase in that article for me and it is 3 simple words - "reignite his career" . The lad was playing for Celtic as a youngster and had played for Scotland youth before having to drop a couple of leagues after Hamilton so he's clearly not a bad player. However, that fall from the top level has got to hurt a little and of course the head can go down. The article talks about how he wants full time football ... if he wants it enough, then perhaps he is motivated to work hard and achieve it. Give the lad a chance and hopefully it works out for us (and him).

last communication 9th July 2021 from Mavor and Keith with the invoice for Cammy Harper's home shirt and Lewis Hyde's home shirt (for younger players it was cheaper so just noted we would get a 'gift' as thanks not a shirt). No word on 2022/23 season or on the pickup/availability of 2021/22 items although we did get a thank you email when we paid the invoice 🙂

Canada thought they would be the team who had the longest wait to get back in ... 1986 was their one and only appearance. 2022 is shaping up to be controversial though ... First the CSA (Canadian FA) scheduled a game against Iran for last weekend, without realising there are still some pretty raw and emotional diplomatic issues around the downing of Ukrainian Flight 752 in 2020, given that 55 of the 176 killed were Canadian citizens and a further 30 were Canadian residents. Then after they hastily rescheduled the opponent to be Panama, the team promptly went on strike due to issues over how the association plan to distribute the qualification monies from the world cup. The association - who could rival the SFA for parochialism - have offered a mere 10% of the millions in unexpected windfall payments to the squad and there is also disparity in how they treat the men's and women's teams as well as views on development monies. The teams are asking to be treated equally and for the prize fund to players to be set to 40% (in line with other top 50 nations apparently), and for the CSA to ensure that for Qatar the team's families do not have to pay their own way to the tournament (also standard for other nations). What should be a triumph for Canada in getting to the world cup, and then in potentially hosting about a quarter of the games for the next world cup in 2026 is rapidly descending into a farce that Ernie Walker would be proud of. https://www.sportsnet.ca/soccer/article/canada-mens-national-soccer-team-game-vs-panama-cancelled-amid-wage-dispute/

Agree - and its not just at concert time. When we are planning a trip, which most recent visit excepted, is typically 6 or more months in advance, I could typically rent a house for a month for less than the cost of booking an average hotel room for a week. As a family we do prefer to do the whole AirBnB or VRBO thing and have some go-to rentals in Inverness that we check first ... but we also take a look at hotel offers and the costs are insane so they are quickly discarded. Does seem a bit top heavy on the face of things but all good points you raise. Provided the outlay is generating growing income and improving services then so be it ... we have never operated at a profit, always relying on a cup run or wealthy directors putting in a few pennies here and there. If we can use sponsorship, advertising board sales, and other non-football or non-matchday revenue generators then the outlay for staff to bring those deals in and make our offerings more professional may be worthwhile as that in itself may help get us closer to balancing the books. I am not going to crucify anyone on reducing an expected deficit in the middle of a pandemic when all of these things are challenging even in normal times but we do need to be mindful of it. Its a bit of a broken record, but if there is one area we are still lacking it is communication at some levels and there is no excuse for that. The club have their own website and social media to get things out there, they also have many other fan-based organisations or outlets that the as well.

Good luck to Ukraine against Wales. By far the better team for large spells of this match. Thought Scotland were poor in the first half and - not because he is former ICT - I thought it was only when Christie came on and the midfield got more of a grip of the ball that our performance got better. Almost a grandstand finish, which would have been just like Scotland to do things the hard way, but unfortunately (like ICT in the STJ game) when you commit so many forward, you run the risk of conceding that late killer goal. Hope they do the business against the Welsh (no offence to Wales) and then light up the tournament at the end of the year. If they get there I think they will be a lot of people's sentimental choice and seem solid enough to do well. Oh well, at least Canada qualified so I have that to look forward to, and hopefully for Scotland to get to the 2026 world cup and maybe be based in Toronto!

I think you nailed it from a fan perspective. (For me) it is all about the day out with the actual match being just a part of that. If you are going to go to the football then you are going to go whether its on TV or not in most cases. You might choose not to on a wet and windy night in January, but that decision might have been the same whether its on telly or not. If there is an ICT game on a Saturday afternoon but Celtic -V- anyone is live on TV then I am still going to the ICT game As I said in earlier posts, I could/would argue that removing the blackout could actually be better for some clubs. You may miss out on one or two folk in the local area who watch on telly, but you also broaden your potential viewership to a wider audience, in our case of users from the central belt and beyond as well as those outside the country who wouldn't go to the game anyway. If you can reach a critical mass so that it pays for itself then anything on top of that is just gravy 🙂

@No Shin Guards - if you have an issue with how the site is managed, lets discuss this in another thread or via message system. As noted, by a couple of our mods, you are closing your own topics according to the site logs so no-one is shutting you down. However, your methodology and phraseology are familiar to me so lets not pretend here! As mentioned, you do bring some interesting points to the discussions, so lets focus on that, and not the misguided attempt to manufacture censorship that is not in existence.