ictchris

I watched Moneyball today, hopefully Richie Foran is the new Jonah Hill.

Heard we've given Dean Ebbe the log-in for the club MySpace account, depending how he develops there he'll move up to Facebool then Instagram, then Twitter.

Building for the future.  #Believe #Achieve #Retrieve

41 minutes ago, dougal said:

 

Surely this guy will be added to the development squad and not thrown straight into the first team or will he?

Having said that he might be the ideal striker to gun down Elgin as he plays at a similar level to them currently 

You got to wonder what exactly is the clubs scouting policy though when they are looking at these levels in foreign countries, ok you might get the odd gem but I can't see many players playing at that level making the step up successfully

Regardless he's a young player and I for one wish him the best and welcome him to ICT

Dougal

 

It'll be a tall order to make an immediate step up but you can find guys at a lower level who can develop into useful players.  We signed Danny Williams from the English sixth tier, Marley Watkins had played one season in their fifth tier.  There's a big difference between full and part time football though, that can take some getting used to.

If we've signed him as a squad player and one to develop then it's interesting.  However, we are bottom of the league, on the worst run our club has ever had in the league.  We need players to change things NOW.

Obviously County aren't sustainable and I'm not saying that they are anything for us to follow.  The point is that relegation could be catastrophic for us and we need to be utterly, completely focused on stopping it.

Probably a lower level than that.  A couple of League of Ireland reserve teams play in this league.  

When it comes to comparing leagues, the Scottish Premiership is ranked 23rd in UEFAs club co-efficient table.  The League of Ireland is ranked 37th and this is the third tier of that league.

Looking on the positive side, we had him on trial beforehand so must have done some sort of assessment of his standards.  Just because someone is playing at a low level doesn't necessarily mean they can't make a step up - we hope.

If you leave out scoring goals and preventing the opposition from scoring goals we are actually in pretty good shape.  Sadly this is what football is based on.

We are a stale team, we've relied on the core of Warren-Meekings then Tansey-Draper for too long and haven't got enough depth to deal with injuries or loss of form.  We are now reaping that, considering that Warren and Meekings have been poor,as has Tansey.  Draper has maintained his form the best, although this has meant he has to play further up to offer attackign threat, rather than focusing on the middle of park and dominating there, which is capable of doing.  Defensively our organisation is terrible and for some reason we are having to play an error-prone goalkeeper who is carrying an injury.

Going forward we must have the least level of threat that I've seen from us in years.  Our three strikers are two big targets (Doumbaya and Fisher), one of whom works hard and the other had a short purple patch, and a total bust in Boden.  When you go further back to our '3' we aren't threatneing at all.  We seem to throw players onto the pitch and stand back waiting for the 'TA-DAH' and them winning.  "Lets play Doran, he's a good player....".  The team doesn't have a plan, we don't seem to know what to do and we are slow and passive.  Part of that is the central role given to Vigurs, who slows the play down and lacks urgency.  I understand why we play him, he's got talent and is excellent from set pieces but the way he influences the rest of our play isn't good enough and is possibly negative.  Around him we launch in players here and there, again no concept of how to beat the opposition.  Stick in Mulreany, he's fast.  Put on Polworth, he can score goals.  Give Doran or King a try or Larnell Cole or whoever.  It's the tombola of mediocrity and it needs to stop.

Say what you like about Roy McGregor, he knows that it's very difficult to run a full time football team outside the top flight in Scotland so when County look like they are in trouble he makes sure hsi team stays up.  We are going to downsize our way into being the next St Mirren or Dunfermline, both clubs who were established in the top flight but have busted out.  I don't have much confidence in us managing to change the squad in the window either, maybe this guy we've signed from the Leinester Mens Sunday League (corner flag and goalnets cost extra) will shoot us to safety.

The third tier of Irish football.  I feel closer to safety already.

I am the biggest superfan, I have favourited every tweet from the official Twitter account this season.

Charles Bannerman gives the young team a talking to

I've seen a few places say that Larnell is Andy Cole's son, he isn't.  Andy Cole does have a son about the same age who is signed to Man City, I think, so I can see why people might make the mistake.

I'm a little worried by Foran saying that he thinks we've got enough goals in midfield to make up for him not getting another forward in.  Over the past few years we've had a solid striker - last season Storey scored 13 goals, season before Mckay made double figures and Ofere got a goal every other game when he came in, before that we had Mckay hitting 20 a season.  I don't think Fisher, however hard he works, is a goalscorer, he's more of a Graham Bayne style forward, which is valuable of course.  Doumbaya seems more of a target man but the juries out I suppose.  Boden has really struggled from what I've seen and his confidence will have taken a knock after being dropped and Sutherland is a kid.  The lack of goals is palpable and if we are relying on guys like Cole or Mulreany then we could be found wanting.  Both are pretty raw, especially Mulreany.  The fact that Ross Draper has been our main goal threat tells you we are lacking something.

Best case is that we are just adapting to how Foran wants us to play - pushing up and attacking down the wings with King, Mulreany, Cole and even Polworth, getting balls in to Fisher and Doumbaya.  Worst case we've got strikers who can't score backed up by guys who aren't experienced or good enough to make up for that.

Time will tell.

Slogans under the badge are an embarrassment.  It's almost as bad as clubs putting stars above their badge.  What exactly is the point?

Boycotting the club over it though, steady on.

Scott Boden will be signing in the next couple of days, Newport County striker.  He scored 15 goals for a pretty poor Newport side last season and hit double figures with both Halifax Town and Maccelsfield in previous seasons.  He played with both Ross Draper and Carl Tremarco at Macclesfield.

Sign a massive target man.

Sign several pacey wingers, play alongside target man.

Hit constant long balls, diagonals, crosses to target man.

Get pacey wingers to hoover up all the loose takings.

Win title.

Accept universal acclaim, leave Caley to manage Real Madrid.  Steal Cristiano Ronaldo's bird.

Alan Archibald was on about them wanting £1m for him in January

Here's our team

Fon Williams

-----

Meekings

Warren

Devine

Tremarco

------

Tansey

Draper

Vigurs

Polworth

--------

Storey

Hughes

Bench - Esson, Ryan Williams, Foran, Roberts, Wedderburn, Horner, Danny Williams.

It could be that Storey plays wide rather than up front with Hughes or he plays off him so it's 4-4-1-1.

Things I don't like about that team

1) Danny Devine is starting.  He has cost us goals again and again this season, as we saw in midweek.  Our best centre back pairing is Meekings and Warren we should play those two.  in addition we are playing Meekings out of position to accomodate Devine.  We have Horner on the bench who has done OK at right back but more importantly he IS a right-back.

2) I think Jordan Roberts needs to be starting - he is strong and direct and has pace, all qualities we have been missing in attack.  He hasn't done much that I've seen but always seems first to be subbed and now dropped from the XI.  Hughes has done OK but we're going to be under pressure today and will probably have to play on the counter - Roberts would be much better for that.

3) He might not be fit but if we want to play with a targetman, start with Richie Foran.  He's a talisman and will work hard as well.

4) Lack of width in the midfield.  We might be playing on the counter and keeping our shape compact but having Vigurs and Polworth as the widest midfield players doesn't give us a lot of options.  If we are starting with a big man up front then having good attacking options wide is useful but we don't really have that with this XI.

We were absolutely dire last night. Having to change things around in terms of strikers isn't ideal and altering the shape of the team to include a target man must've been difficult but our performance was negative, timid and dull. We played 3-5-2 with Polworth and Williams as wing backs, Tansey, Draper and Vigurs in midfield and Roberts playing 'off' Hughes up front. 

I thought Hughes actually did well. He isn't the most elegant player but when we hit the ball up to his chest or head he generally took it down or flicked it on. I don't think you could ask much more of him, the problem was that the rest of he team was so deep that he was completely isolated. At one point in the second half he headed a long ball back to Roberts who ran at St Johnstone but our entire team were back in our own half, meaning you are relying on Roberts beating two players and pinging in a wonder goal, which isn't going to happen often with any player. 

We are so focussed on possession that we go backwards and drop deep to maintain it but can't actually play in the oppositions half. Playing with a target man and Wing backs we should've tried to push up and allowed them to either get crosses in for Hughes or at least hit diagonals for him to knock down to runners but we were so deep all we could offer was a long ball to an isolated target. This meant that we didn't create any chances, were pushed deeper and deeper and ended up defending for our lives. You do that and the opposition are bound to score. This style is one reason why we've been conceding so many late goals, we don't impose ourselves on games and end up hanging in constantly only to be broken. 

We are in serious trouble. I've been to three games in the last week and in that time we've created one real chance, the goal from Mutumbo at Easyer Road. That game from players making forward runs, with and without the ball, something we haven't done in any of the other games and we only did in that game because we were going out of the cup. Our main striker has scored one goal in two and half months, our defence can't cope with the pressure our style puts it under, our best creative player (Tansey) is in horrible form. 

Accies on Saturday is huge for us, a must win.

Iona.  THink it opens at 12noon, due to it being Sunday.

Sunday bloody Sunday.

We'll all wish we listened to Renegade when we are faced with the barren, Mad Max style post-apocalytic wasteland that the Gellions Bus v CJT Bus war will reduce our planet to.

MOAR BUSES

You can easily get to Waverley in 40 minutes from Easter Road, espeically if you are 20! You should be jogging there and back in that time.

Hibs don't have cash gates for any games, if they do have pay on the day you'll need to buy your ticket from the kiosk at the away end.

The delay has been very stupid but I don't think the kick off time is that bad.  Also, a formal complaint because the game is on Mother's Day?  Not sure if serious...

I wasn't at this game so can't comment on the facts of this. I would not at all be surprised at stewards picking out an individual rather than trying to pick people out of a group and also being less than truthful when recounting what has happened. I've seen it happen at football countless times. 

Wouldn't be surprised to see both Old Firm games televised on different days.

3 hours ago, Charles Bannerman said:

There appear to be ambiguous statements coming from both sides of this dispute which initially appeared on here through the quoted Original Post.... which I have to say looks like a classic example of adolescent distortion of the facts in response to the imposition of a sanction. You see this in schools on a daily basis with the offence always spun downwards, the sanction quite often spun upwards and the resulting conclusion always being that the treatment was "unfair" (q.v. Harry Enfield's Kevin The Teenager) and that those involved have been victimised. Reality almost invariably tells a different story.

Unfortunately, much of this thread has developed on the basis that the above hyperbolised claims were accurate. Perhaps CJT should have clarified the situation more quickly (although they did do so within around 24 hours of the OP), but perhaps they were reluctant to become involved in a public forum and perhaps they needed time to clarify their own position.

We also need to compare the OP above with this section of the CJT statement:- "Suffice to say, the issue was not about loud singing on the buses. Secondly, the number of fans banned from the Motherwell (and the Motherwell bus only, not all subsequent buses) has been very much overstated. We have a duty to all of our regular travelling supporters to ensure that buses are run within the guidelines set by the bus company and to a standard that the majority of supporters feel is appropriate. This includes several young people who we know travel regularly with CJT." and with the text signed "John Horne" which indicates that the ban is for the Motherwell game only, but on "all persons travelling on that bus".

This invites the following conclusions:- 1) It would appear that, in the best traditions of Kevin The Teenager, NPNP94 has gone out of his way to make light of the original offence. 2) NPNP94's statement "banned from the buses" implies a sanction rather more severe than the reality of just from the Motherwell bus. 3) There is inconsistency between the two CJT versions of who are banned since John Horne states "all persons" whereas the later statement says that the number involved "has been very much overstated". Whether or not this change is a result of subsequent discussion within CJT (and possible later identification of individual offenders?) is open to question.

However it does appear that much of this thread's ire is in response to an OP which is at best ambiguous and at worst disingenuous. Also, if NPNP94 has, as he claims, not been informed of the behaviour which led to the exclusion, why did he say in his OP that it was for "singing" which is arguably one of the post's most inflammatory features.

I would also like to know what level of adult supervision there was on a bus which appears to have been overwhelmingly full of kids - and indeed why a critical mass of potential difficulty was created by putting so many kids were put together in the same bus? I would certainly have expected a significant adult presence which, on the other hand, should have prevented things getting out of hand to the extent to which they appear to have.

 

CJT bus at 1700 on Saturday