Scotty

yup

Feel even better about the result now that Ronaldo has been bleating like an Icelandic lamb .... very ungracious ... Icelandic grapes ... unlike Ronaldo, these arent sour

Oh I love it when that smug grin is wiped off Ronaldo's face. Well done Iceland! a battling performance and a well earned point.

merged two topics started around same time.

Interesting article. I read the comments of Tommy Wilson with interest as it pertains to MLS but its really chalk and cheese. There is a requirement for all MLS teams to have an academy and these form part of the 'must have' items when any new team pays its $100m fee to be awarded an MLS franchise. The financial numbers in MLS, with every team backed by big owners, are colossal in comparison to the SPFL but the stated aim is the same - to develop the game in the USA to a point where they are perpetual powerhouses in the Copa America and World Cup. Canada - by default - may benefit from this because Montreal, Vancouver and Toronto also have academies with a focus on developing Canadian talent and both Edmonton and Ottawa have emerged from the lower leagues to be potential MLS candidates in coming years too. Not sure about the youth academies in Montreal and Vancouver but the Toronto one is regarded as being world class and has seen a conveyor belt of players come through into the first team over the last 10 years and recent Canadian squads have had a total of 17 - mostly U23 - players (out of 32 used) who play their football domestically for one of the three Canadian MLS teams. Interesting times ahead in 5-10 years I think. I know from speaking with a few folk around the club on my recent trip that ICT realise how important youth is and I think we will definitely see some movement on this front but its a hard sell to a lot of other folk. We dont have a lot of money, but you do need money to develop youth. youth will not impact the team instantly so in some eyes its not money well spent. The challenge seems to be persuading some folk that a long term 5-10 year strategy is worth it and how to balance that with budgets elsewhere. Its a huge juggling act when you are operating a business that by default makes a loss every year without cup runs and cash windfalls but once its up and running then it has the potential to be a conveyor belt like some other clubs have. It was also interesting to read Willie Miller mention Iceland and Scot Gemmill minimise them saying we beat them recently (and therefore inferring we must be better) as thats puts both sides of the argument in a nutshell for me. I dont think I have ever said this before but I agree with Willie Miller and Scot Gemmill reminds me of the old duffers at Park Gardens in Ernie Walker's day who believed Scotland were a world power who would always be that without effort !!! Iceland is a good example of football on the rise and the scale is comparable to Scotland. In fact, they only have 325,000 inhabitants so what they have achieved in the last few years is nothing short of remarkable and a testament to the plan they set out to achieve. The FIFA rankings also dont lie (much) ... Iceland has climbed from 110 to 33 in the last 5 years and are running out at Euro 2016, whereas Scotland have typically hovered in the 45-55 range and haven't qualified for a major tournament since France 98. Another good article to read is this one: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/jan/30/volcano-iceland-national-football-team . We stopped in Iceland for 5 days on our way back from our recent trip and to say they are fanatical about their football is an understatement. The national stadium holds only 15000 fans (and only 9800 seated) but there are stadia all over the place. We had lunch in a small town called Grindavik (pop 3000) and it has a tidy looking 1700 capacity single stand stadium. There are 4 divisions of 12-12-12-10 and 4 more provincial/regional leagues of 7-7-7-6 clubs for a total of 73 teams !!! They know they have their limitations, but as they do in life, they also set out to overcome those limitations in sport and it seems to have met with an element of success. I am going to be cheering them on later today as they face up to the challenge of Portugal !

cant hurt - we'll fire it up on our twitter feed and our FB page. feel free to share the URL of the sponsorship pages on your own feed using the share buttons at the bottom of the topic.

updated payments received over weekend. now halfway to our first goal of sponsoring Liam's shirt again. If we exceed that goal, we will look to sponsor other items.

and what a winning goal !!!!!

Really? That is a pretty sweeping generalisation, what facts are you using to back that potentially defamatory statement up? RCFC prices are pretty good, BOTH clubs are for that matter, but the only £165 ticket RCFC seem to offer is the over65/student ticket in the Jailend ..... On the ICT site it notes disabled prices are in line with the age groups but carers - if required - can have a free ticket. The Ross County site has no reference to disabled prices whatsoever on their pricing page and nothing in the notes so unless you called them I dont know where you got that. These are the FULL prices from both clubs and if you were early enough you could have got 10% off the ICT tickets making them cheaper than County in some instances. Like I said, both clubs are pretty good, certainly far better value for money than most other Premiership sides. ICT Main Stand (adult 26+) = £380 / County = £360 ICT Main Stand (young adult 16-25) = £280 / County £ no equivalent ICT Main Stand (U16) = £130 / County = £80 (U18) ICT Main Stand (U12) = £70 / County = £25 (U18) ICT Main Stand (65+) = £ 310 / County £210 dropping to £105 over 75 ICT North Stand (adult 26+) = £330 / County = £300 ICT North Stand (young adult 16-25) = £200 / County £ no equivalent ICT North Stand (U16) = £110 / County = £80 (U18) ICT North Stand (U12) = £FREE / County = £25 (U18) ICT North Stand (65+) = £ 220 / County £165 dropping to £82.50 over 75 ... off to have a shower now after visiting that website over the bridge.

17,800 at the Caps game last night and the Ottawa coach is one mr Paul Dalglish. Was looking forward to seeing TFC playing Ottawa in the final after their 2-0 win in the first leg, but I guess the Caps will have to do. game scheduled for next week in Toronto then the 2nd leg in Vancouver a week later. Our second team more or less shut down Drogba and co last night in the 0-0 draw although it should have been easier for TFC after leading 4-0 in the first leg before Drogba scored one and made the other in the last 5 minutes for a 4-2 final score.

Pledged/Paid List Scotty CaleyD Weeman Bughtmaster homesickjaggie Caley Mad In Berks Alex MacLeod Aileen MacLeod Tree Jagster Northstandfan JonahICT 12th Man PerthICT Badly_Drawn RossP finmack Oddquine Oddquine luvgravy MissICT ictbob Gringo Mrs Gringo The_Sponge The_Sponge The_Sponge Cal550 TheCaleyOne Maimie ICT29 EyeSettee Tichy_Blacks_Back ilpadrino The Mantis The Mantis Fraz TM4TJ TM4TJ TM4TJ Murchison IBM --------- note: if you have any issues with payments etc, please leave a note below or send a PM. I will delete any non-relevant support discussions once we have sorted whatever the problem was just to keep the thread tidy.

Was thinking that .... He's always been touted as a future manager for us, but what cemented his commitment to ICT in my mind was that he didn't follow his mentor Terry Butcher to Hibs like he did when Butcher came to Inverness: A quick Google search shows how much Butcher meant to Foran, and by extension, how much Inverness CT, his family and the area must mean to him now. http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/richie-foran-wants-to-repay-terry-1556528#I04sewp0sqUbm1RD.97 http://www.newsandstar.co.uk/My-career-was-saved-by-Terry-Butchers-wife-says-ex-Carlisle-Utd-ace-Richie-Foran-bb878e1e-03c9-4b28-9a70-9b05055a100a-ds There is also an excellent BBC article by Martin Dowden here that I think nails it in terms of our managerial dilemma : http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/36348419

and I could close this and other topics if they continue to be so focused on personal abuse and slagging instead of the topic at hand. Lets stay classy folks

IF he has done his badges (I assume he has as its required) then I am cautiously optimistic. Those courses are pretty intensive and thorough. He's clearly a man with an inspirational leadership style, and from what I hear more attached to the area than some of his predecessors. He's never been a shrinking violet so with an experienced #2 - of his own choosing - to assist and mentor him, and to help minimise the inevitable mistakes or tactical naivety that will inevitably surface I think he could do well. Craig Brewster (first time round) and Charlie Christie both did fine as SPL managers with little experience. One thing I did like in his statement was that he was immediately hanging up his boots to concentrate on being a manager. That, to me, shows a level of determination to succeed. When Brewster came to us first time round, he tried to combine the two, thinking he could be both a manager and a "Roy of the Rovers" style player who could manage from on the pitch. It doesnt seem to work at the top level so fair play to RF for electing to do only one job .... hopefully for all our sakes he does it well !

this one

Every manager has brought something to the table in terms of fond memories and success. Unfortunately, the one thing they all have in common (with the possible exception of Christie who stepped down and remained) is leaving the club somewhat acrimoniously in the eyes of some or all supporters. Sergei was on a hiding to nothing having come from one half of our founding clubs, and didnt really have much if any success, but he will always be our first manager, and the man who oversaw many firsts for "CT" in that inaugural season in 1994-95. Paterson obviously guided us through the leagues playing some good stuff and masterminded 'that' result in 2000. Robbo guided us to the SPL and was very vocal in getting the rules changed whilst our chairman at the time was quietly effective in doing the same thing out of the public eye. Brewster had a measure of success and got us the fittest we have ever been, Charlie did well and lest we forget, our first time of finishing "best of the rest" we played all 5 post-split games achieving victory and not conceding a goal - something that had never been done before. Lets set aside Brewster 2.0 and move quickly on ... Butcher also had a good team around him and talked a good game as well as making some good signings and moving us forward and Yogi too will go down in history as the manager to have won us the Scottish Cup and navigated our first foray into Europe. Who should succeed him? I am not sure. The same old names will get trotted out although Owen Coyle might be an interesting addition to the normal list in the merry go round although I think he is more likely to end up in England somewhere. A lot of mentions for Richie Foran in some role but lets not forget that whoever becomes manager MUST have their UEFA badges. Its a UEFA requirement for anything more than a caretaker manager job in the top division of each country. Does Richie have these? Does anyone else who might be promoted from within like Esson or Yogi's assistant whose future is still unclear have these ? I will leave the board to make the right decision. KC and the rest of the directors chose Yogi for the position when he was not everybody's first (or second or third) choice and despite initial misgivings from a sizeable chunk of our support, until recently, where rifts became apparent, it seemed to be a pretty good fit. If KC wants to think outside the box again for a new manager or head coach then I personally am going to trust him on both a personal and professional basis. I have known him for 15+ years and he is a man of integrity, and I know he has (and always has had) the best interests of ICT at his core.

what is this ... Ikea ?

correct. the table uses the data that we provide and the software cannot handle the split ! any budding (or expert) php/sql experts are welcome to assist us in updating it as its on the to-do list !

I would respectfully disagree. I have known Kenny for nigh on 15 years and he is a man of integrity who will (and has) taken a fair bit of flak. This is not a knee jerk reaction or a case of going in a huff ..... On the playing side I would agree with several of our managers pulling off some decent signings. However, given that our club never makes a profit without some form of windfall or administrative magic, or indeed (over the years) smaller sums of monies put in by those same directors then I would argue that the board should take a large amount of credit ... otherwise those signings, and an SPL budget (even if its a low one) would not be possible. Who says a contingency plan is not in place? If the relationship had indeed got that bad then to think otherwise would seem foolish. Assuming this happens, I am sure the club (and the chairman) will have a plan ... after all, Yogi himself was not favourite for the job when the chairman took a gamble and gave it to him ....

barring a huge swing in voting in the remaining voting time I can confirm that ROSS DRAPER is the CaleyThistleOnline Player of the Year (elect) for 2015-2016. Ross took the Player of the Month honours for May, by a considerable margin from Jordan Roberts, and after taking maximum points in 2 of the 3 games leapfrogs Miles Storey to our award. A full story and breakdown of the voting will follow once I get back to Canada next weekend

POY poll and other threads will be late as I will be at game.

THE MATCHDAY THREAD Discuss ICT & other games in this thread as they happen Inverness CT -V- Dundee PREVIEW 14th May @ 12:30, Caledonian Stadium Follow us on Twitter Follow us on Facebook Go to the Chatroom Media Coverage AUDIO BBC Sportsound Open All Mics [UK Only] TEXT ESPN BBC SKY Sporting Life VIDEO SPL YouTube Channel ICT Official YouTube Channel TEAM LINEUPS TO FOLLOW Tweets by @ICTFC Tweets by @ICTFC

Richard Gordon was more diplomatic and called him a hothead .... but his behaviour not a surprise apparently.

Hamilton down to 10 men - Mackinnon gets into it with Vigurs apparently then loses it completely, two yellows and a red in quick succession.