ictchris

Duncan Ferguson is leaving Everton at the end of this season apparently.

Get him signed, if only to reduce any house-breaking in the Inverness area as County-supporting burglars run scared of Dunc's renowned crime-fighting capablilities. The extra £70,000 we got for finishing 7th will pay his wages for two weeks.

Rory McAllister has just turned 18 and has only started four matches for us. He has made a number of sub appearences and has scored one goal. He has scored regularly for the reserves (does anyone have any stats for him at this level?) and has been given international recognition at Under 19 level. Martin Bavidge had a pretty similar record at the same age, but at a much lower level in the game.

I have seen Rory play a few times for the reserves and he has looked far better in those games than when he's played in the first team. He shows better touch and control than he has so far in the first team. I think he often looks nervous and anxious when he gets a game for the firsts and thus makes silly mistakes. He also needs to work on retaining possession, holding the ball up. At this level it's unforgivable to have the ball come back time and again, hopefully he can work on this. Brewster saw something in him and hopefully Rory managed to pick up striing tips from Brew while he was here - say what you like about our ex-boss but he was as good a teacher for Rory as you could ask for.

I do have hopes for Rory and I really hope he's given a fair crack of the whip by our sometimes fickle fans.

Edited to say that I also think it's a bit early to judge him, he hasn't had much of a chance to impress. Here are the details of how much he's played this season:

v Alloa - 25 minutes

v Dundee Utd - 85 minutes*

v Celtic - 3 minutes

v DUnfermline - 20 minutes

v Livingston - 11 minutes

v Hibs - 20 minutes

v Aberdeen - 80 minutes*

v Ayr Utd - 90 minutes*

v Livingston - 21 minutes

v Ayr Utd - 5 minutes

v Celtic - 11 minutes

v Aberdeen - 4 minutes

v Livingston - 11 minutes

v Motherwell - 8 minutes

v Dundee Utd - 9 minutes

v Livingston - 7 minutes

v Falkirk - 26 minutes

v Dunfermline - 77 minutes*

* - start

That's only an average of 28 minutes per appearance and it's difficult to make an impression snatching appearences here and there from the bench.

He has scored goals in the reserves and Under 19s and was in the Scotland U-19 squad, so has potential. It must be hard coming off the bench at the end of games.

Hellish game. Barry's free kick was the only moment of skill in the game. Good to send Livingston down though. Their tannoy announcer was hilarious

According to the daily record today we are prepating to move for Rankin in thenext week or two.

I am very reliably informed that there are THREE potential targets fer next season.. Rankin, Robb and Morrow. We have also put in interest fer Brighton of Clyde but he may well go fer higher places.

like anyone will believe you after your richard gough thing IHE

Morrow? Hmm. Brighton is apparently heading for England.

I see that our former boss has released Grant Brebner from Tannadice. I think Brebner is an excllent player and I'd take him in a flash. Wages could be a problem and there are his personal problems to take into account as well but he could view coming here as a 'fresh start'.

I can't imagine the denziens of West Lothian turning out in their masses for this.

2,200 for the game against Dundee utd

2,600 for the game against us.

I predict a sub-2000 crowd. Livi's last home SPL game (barring a miracle) will be midweek against Motherwell, that could be a real low one, especially if they charge £18.

I got expelled for multiple murder, bank robbery and heroin dealing.

Boys will be boys though.

I.H.E., I think you are being slightly unfair to Caff - he has done OK in the SPL considering most of his appearances have been covering for injury or suspension. Certainly up until he lost his place to Dodsy he had done well and was unlucky to lose his place at all - his sending off was a bit dodgy.

I really hope we keep him as he is excellent cover. Perhaps Caff should look to Richard Hastings for inspiration - Hastings was barely involved last season but is a first choice player this season. If Dods or Granty were injured, suspended or left Caff can walk into the side.

I think bringing in a left winger/midfielder would not be a good use of resources. As has been said Alan Morgan and Roy McBain can both play there, as can Stuart Golabek. Bringing in Robson or Rankin would be expensive and I don't think it would represent value for money.

With regards to a striker, Marino Keith hasn't featured much for Colchester Utd this season and might be a decent option to bring back North, although I'm sure he'd be on a lot more than we could afford. His strike partner Chris Iwelumo would be a great additoin as a targetman, but I doubt he'd come.

We offered £40,000 for John Rankin in the transfer window, is he really worth more than that? Jason Scotland is inconsistent and hardly set the SPL on fire when he was playing for Dundee Utd either. Colin Healy has played about five games in the last two years, he could be a decent signing but he would be a risk.

Feyenoord is probably feeling tetchy because he hasn't seen his side score a goal for over five games or win a game for over two months.

I think they are called the Blades because of Sheffields steel-making past.

I think more teams should be named after their local industries. Peterhead could be the Fishermen, Aberdeen the Oil Rigs and Ross County the Incapacity Benefits.

Caff scoring against Motherwell last season was pretty good - it ended a run of five straight defeats.

Paul Cherry scoring the winner against Livingston in the last minute of extra time in the Bells Cup the season we won the league was pretty sweet.

I remember Rosscoe making the w@nker sign behind Davide Xausa's back as well, very funny

I'll be going.

Cheerio

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Don't Listen to the Radio - The Vines

I think we should arrange to play our pre-season games in Edinburgh, the Lothians and Fife.

While Dross C*unty have made an interesting managerial appointment in Leitch I think that they could very well have blown their chances of promotion for a while. The seasons of abject pish under Alex Smith have eaten up money - Roy McGregor et al pumped money into the club over this period so that Smith could sign up such luminaries as David Winters, Stuart Taylor, Gary McSwegan, Jim Hamilton, David Hannah etc. Now that the useless fan-dan Smith has been removed the money has run out and there will have to be swinging cuts in the budget. No one would be surprised to see John Rankin and Don Cowie moved on in the summer, Martin Canning has already been sold to Gretna. What are the chances of bringing in players of a similar quality?

If County had had a good manager in place when they were putting in money then they could have won the First division in the last few years. Unfortunately they had Smith who, despite his erse being kissed by football journalists nationwide, pissed their money up against a wall. I went to see County play St Mirren last season (the game had been cancelled at short notice and admission to the away end was free) and they looked a broken, nothing team. They tipped and tapped the ball about in their own half but as soon as they looked remotely threatening, ANdy Millen, Kirk Broadfoot and Kevin McGowane stepped in and COunty couldn't do anything about it.

Anyway, finish on a song:

Let's all laugh at County

Let's all laugh at County

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

Let's all laugh at County

Let's all laugh at County

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

Let's all laugh at County

Let's all laugh at County

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

Let's all laugh at County

Let's all laugh at County

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

Let's all laugh at County

Let's all laugh at County

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

I see that Iain Vigurs, ex Elgin City, scored for the Under 19s. I'd have thought that he'd be in line for a move up to the first team, he has already played league football at Elgin. Also, Guy Kerr has experience for Scotland U-16s and is getting regular games in the reserves and U19s.

I don't think that Pele would have won the First Division in 2004. His teams were fantastic to watch but would we have hauled back Clyde playing his way? It's doubtful. Having said that, the first half of the 2002/03 season was the best football I've ever seen us play - I think we won 13 out of 15 games in the league, with one defeat and a draw where we came from 3-0 down.

Apparently there will be an annoucement on the County job at noon today with Pele one of the names linked. Also in the frame, according to todays Sun is Motherwell captain Scott Leitch :shock:

From the Evening Times:

CHARLIE CHRISTIE wants to see the day when Inverness can sell a homegrown player to a top English Premiership club.

Boss Christie will give Stuart Soane and Zander Sutherland the chance to step up from the under-19s in the remaining five games of the season.

He said: "It is important that some of our own youngsters start to come through and although we have made great strides in youth development, we are still unable to overcome that final hurdle of getting them into the first team. If they can then step on and get a transfer to a bigger club then what a huge success story that would be."

I'm pretty sure I've seen Sutherland in a couple of youth/reserves games and he looked not bad. Is he the wee wide player?

Nice one Pedro.

Alan Gow would cost too much and isn't any good anyway.

We should try and sign Don Cowie from County, he is a decent wee player apparently. Rankin has gone off the boil since the transfer window and if he does move it'll be more than likely to St Mirren or a team like that, ie from the South. Perhaps we could look to England, we did not bad getting Ian Black and Alan Morgan from Blackburn.

Edited to say: I see in teh press Gordon Strachan wants to put some of his younger players out on loan for next season. This could be worth a look at, a player like Charlie Mulgrew would be a good addition.