Scotty

If you are so good Feb8 - how come you have never entered our Xpert11 league ??? CaleyD will post details soon of how anyone can enter this league - we have been running it for several 'virtual seasons' and need some new blood

Charlie has given him a chance ... its up to him to grab it. From what I hear he has not always tried that hard in training and it sounds like he didnt make any impact at County. His alleged 'laziness' has been a major part of his problem .... The ball - as they say - is firmly in the player's court and the only person that can now blow this chance is the lad himself.

"CONCACAF" Rankings with Gold Cup groups added - Guadeloupe not even on list as you said !!! [attach=1] The Gold Cup is a fairly long and drawn out competition - qualification began in September 2006 and the "lesser" teams (even though some are ranked higher than the likes of Canada) went through a load of qualifiers ..... In the Carribean, 24 teams started in 6 groups with the top two in each group going through to the next round. The second round was in three groups and again, the top two in each group went through with the two best third placed teams playing off for an additional spot and Trinidad seeded to enter at this stage. The third round of games was two groups of 4 with the top two in each going into the semis (and the gold cup) Qualifiers (in ranked order) : Haiti, Trinidad & Tobago, Cuba, Guadeloupe In the central America qualifiers, there were only 7 teams so 1 group of 4 and 1 group of 3. After the first round of games, The top 2 teams went to the semis and beyond and the two third placed teams played off for 5th place. 5 teams qualified Qualifiers (in ranked order) : Costa Rica, Panama, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras Canada, USA and Mexico appear to go straight into the competition as I cant find any qualification rounds ?

From FIFA.com ..... Over in Group A in Miami, Guadeloupe - who drew Haiti in their fist match - kept up their Cinderella ways with a stunning 2-1 win over heavily-fancied Canada. Costa Rica and Haiti drew 1-1 in the night's final match to leave Guadeloupe alone at the top of the section. After watching Guadeloupe's opening-day draw with Haiti from the bench, 41-year-old former France international and Marseilles winger Jocelyn Angloma needed only nine minutes to open the scoring against Canada. The Canucks - who won their first match in impressive fashion 2-1 over Costa Rica - came back in minute 31 through Ali Gerba's wicked, long-range strike. Things looked to be getting back to the status quo, but just three minutes later David Fleurival slammed a screamer home from 30 yards to put the tiny French Caribbean island cluster in the lead again - where they stayed until the end to earn their first-ever victory in regional competition.

Whilst there was talk of Zander and Rory maybe getting into the Scotland U20 squad .... it may have gone un-noticed to some that Richard Hastings was recalled to the Canadian National Team a few months ago - and is now in the squad for the Gold Cup. He has played both matches so far (full 90 mins in each) as Canada beat out Costa Rica 2-1 but went down to Guadeloupe by the same scoreline

we now have a smilie for you to put at the end of your jokes ........

As predicted !!!!! its the standard procedure !!!

sure the chairman would be happy with that ...... but bear in mind, the bigger the team, the less money Barry might make as most teams will require payment in some form or another for things like making an appearance, hotels, travel costs etc .... this is standard practice in friendlies and cant see it being any different for a testimonial unless the opposing team waive any fees etc.

mmmm ... might it have anything in common with the following things http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6180387388162839873 [attach=1] [attach=2]

squad seems a bit lopsided ..... 8 defenders but only 5 midfielders ??? not sure the formation the team plays but if it is a standard 4-4-2 then surely 3 x GK, 7 x DEF, 7 x MID and 4 x FWD might have made more sense .... might have helped Zander's cause but probably not Rory !!! They dont fly out for another two weeks so there's always time for call-offs and late additions to the squad !!

Zander Sutherland and Rory McAllister will not be spending the summer in Canada after being left out of the squad for the U20 World Cup. Shame about that as I was looking forward to wearing an ICT shirt and maybe persuading some of the TFC diehards to support them at Toronto's BMO Field if Scotland reached the latter stages .... full squad Goalkeepers Scott Fox (Celtic) Greg Kelly (Aberdeen) Andrew McNeil (Hibernian) Defenders Andrew Cave-Brown (Norwich City) Andrew Considine (Aberdeen) Scott Cuthbert (Celtic) Garry Kenneth (Dundee United) Alan Lowing (Rangers) Ryan O’Leary (Kilmarnock) Mark Reynolds (Motherwell) Lee Wallace (Heart of Midlothian) Midfielders Jamie Adams (Kilmarnock) Ryan Conroy (Celtic) Brian Gilmour (Clyde) Sean Lynch (Hibernian) Michael McGlinchey (Celtic) Forwards Ross Campbell (Hibernian) Graham Dorrans (Livingston) Calum Elliot (Heart of Midlothian) Steven Fletcher (Hibernian) Robert Snodgrass (Livingston)

cant you just feel the love in this thread ....... I'm on Blackieforce's side on this one .... a missing apostrophe and an extra comma are certainly not the worst examples of grammar on here recently. and no yellow cards for anyone - smart arse response to the original post and a fair enough comeback (including smilie) to the smart arse response .... I am in a good mood today ... must be time for my medicine :icon_nurse01:

Good luck to him. also interesting to see Pele finally get Marino Keith - a player he was rumoured to have wanted to sign for ICT for years.

Lost 1-2 to New York Red Bulls tonight :( ..... Scottish connection - ex Rangers player Claudio Reyna is captain and another ex ger Ronald Wattereus is keeper (but was out injured tonight) ... Despite losing two goals in the second half, it was a decent game and Toronto played one of the slickest passing games I have seen in a long time ... at least in the first half ... second half it was a different TFC and it allowed league leaders NY to grab a couple of goals.

Facebook is the site of choice on this side of the pond now ........ cant remember if I am on bebo or myspace as these are all blocked at work and i usually forget to look at these things from home.

Congrats ...... see you at your next game in 18 years time :023:

Costa Rica [shudder]

Good article in the Courier about Grant Munro - HERE Talking about the chance of being captain ... "It would be a great honour, I really enjoyed captaining the side in the games against Falkirk and St Mirren last season. However, there are probably a number of contenders to become captain, but if it did come my way then I would be absolutely delighted." About his ICT future ... "I'm very happy at Caley Thistle, I'm contracted to the club until 2009, but in football you don't know what could be around the next corner. You could get dropped through a loss of form or injured, so things can change very quickly. However, if the opportunity came along to stay at the club even longer then I would be delighted." :clapping03: :021: :021: :clapping03:

I can see the point Charles, but in the current scenario they have to qualify first ( through several rounds) and that isnt always an easy task, then they might get a bye in the first round proper - or not - and face anyone from div 3 or 2 in the second round before the big guns come in at round 3 ... in theory I would suggest that this new route might be easier ... 1st round - playing reasonably equal opponents 2nd round could play equal opponents or a senior (Div3) side - which some would argue could be equal opponents 3rd round could still play equal opponents or a tougher opponent from Div2 or 1 4th round - anything goes !!! I can see many "shocks" in the 1st and 2nd rounds as some of the better non league sides put some of the stale perpetual bottom feeders to the sword but what seems quite good to me is that you know going into it (as a non league side) that you need to raise your game after every round as it will truly get more difficult.

You mean like "Bring it on Home" (hip hop mix) :rotflmao: :015: :015:

The Clyde one is a beauty :015: :015: ... complaining about their own pitch !!! class. It just goes to show though, when it comes to complaining and trying to circumvent or overturn the rules in Scottish football the more things change, the more they stay the same ....

fair play to the SFA - the format was stale and eventually they realised this and changed it. Definitely a step in the right direction. Harking back to pre ICT days, the Scottish Cup was always something to look forward to and the new format will hopefully generate a little excitement and some cash for the smaller teams. Even though the format that the Fly posted seems complicated, when you re-read it a couple of times it starts to make perfect sense .... non-league and lower league teams have a chance to progress (and make more money) based on the tiered nature of the draw and byes look to be completely eliminated. I like it. two thumbs up to the SFA (for once). :021:

indeed :sillywave:

cant see it being too different in format - just means first round (or will they call it preliminary) will have as many byes as it has games (20 of each) if it includes the 40 non-league clubs and 20 division 2 and 3 sides. however - well done on the SFA for at least letting the non league sides have a crack - who knows, we could have a few upsets and some interest. If i have my sums right, this would be the format. rd P = 40 + 20 = 60 teams. 20 games, 20 byes to get down to 40 teams rd 1 = 40 teams = 20 games to get to last 20 teams rd 2 = 20 teams = 10 games to get to last 10 teams rd 3 = 16 games as the 22 SPL & div1 teams join the remaining 10 teams from rds 1&2 rd 4 = 8 games Rd qf = 4 games Rd sf = 2 games Rd F = 1 game

ok - I could have sworn I posted twice in this thread and other messages seem to be missing ....... what gives ?