Renegade

I don't see any reason why he won't recover. In fact he's probably the right age to make an excellent recover, he's not "so young" anyway. It's usually when they're getting on a bit that these injuries become career ending.

What's that then? He's either amazing, or he's dreadful. I don't think he has a "usual self". BTW how was Shinnie? I thought he was very good against Albion. One for the future I reckon.

I really blew it this week....

Has anyone else ever wondered how well Hayes would do sitting just behind the front two?

I had a wee look at the Faroe Islands teams on Wikipedia earlier and there also seems to be a few Nigerians over there as well as one Sierra Leone internationalist. Can't say I've heard of him though. I seem to recollect something about this on P&B once and someone made the point that the Faroe Islands aren't part of the EU, thus can play Brazilians and other nationalities easier using their own rules than they could here due to the EU rules. This may also be the reason why a good number of Brazilians play in the Asian leagues and in Australia.

Under Steve Paterson ICT used score for fun and that's the key here. A defensive style may well work for some away games but attacking football has to return at the Tulloch Arena. I can remember when ICT were said to be the most entertaining team in Britain. Can't say the same now. Attacking football at home especially will make the chances of the 1st Division trophy much better, will pull a bigger crowd and sell more season tickets. Look at what happened when Mowbray went to Hibs. He played attractive attacking football and low and behold the season ticket sales went up. Bring back attacking football to Inverness. That's what's needed. Edit - And another thing. ICT used to have a good home record due to having a huge pitch. The biggest, or one of the biggest at the time in Britain IIRC. I believe it still is one of the bigger ones. What Paterson used to do was play the ball as wide as possible, keeping the wingers on the wings (something that does seem to be finally re-emerging under Terry Butcher) and getting passed the other teams. For years now ICT have been far too narrow. And one final thing to notice. Why is it than when ever a goal kick is going to be taken, both teams wander along to one side of the field. It's like sheep following the leader. I've even noticed both Tokely and Proctor (when playing right-back) plod over onto the centre-left side of the pitch. Why? Is it a wind thing moving the ball that way? What I'd do if I were boss would be having them move over but having one shoot wide out to the side. For example. Esson's about to take a goal kick and the whole team move to the left. Johnny Hayes is playing right midfield and runs over to the line just before Esson kicks it forward. Esson can then punt the ball over to him as best he can and doesn't even need to get it off the ground of its going fast enough and Hayes can then control it and run down the line. He'd be in acres of space at this point and can try and ping the ball into the box. Jack Charlton used a system sililar to this with Ireland to some success and would be a great tactic for ICT to use when something like this happens.

Because this defensive style will only hold for so long. Also, every time I've seen Stratford (both home league games and the two cup ones against Albion and Stranraer), he's been useless. McBain is far better round there. He might be getting on a bit, but he could still put in a better shift than Stratford. I'm no fan of Duncan at all, but I'd even have him instead of Stratford. Bulvitis is another one. Might have some games where he's alright but not the answer in the long run IMO. Desperately needing a Dods/Mann type in there next to Munro. Seems too clumsy for my liking and should Butcher stick with him for the rest of the season which I predict he will, I won't at all surprised to see a good number of own goals/penaltys being given away by him. Eagle's another. Exactly what does he add to the team? He might have a good cross but he can't do much else. Awfully one footed as well. ICT desperately need a right winger as well I reckon. Finally some sanity: What is Hayes? For the last two games he has played a textbook right winger's role very effectively. Perhaps but he's a left winger naturally. I'd like to see a right footed Hayes on the left and a right footed Hayes on the right. I suspect there's a strong streak of wind-up in your team line-up posts Renegade, No, not at all. but seriously, I wouldn't meddle with the team that started against Partick and Morton: as I said on the matchday thread, there's a real understanding beginning to develop between the players, and the approach yesterday was anything but defensive. I'll concede that I wasn't there yesterday, so if what you say is true (and I have no reason to believe it isn't) then that is good news. I think you should look again at Stratford, by the way - he's very unflashy but he actually gets through a lot of work closing down attacking opponents and allowing Cox to play the more offensive midfield role. Okay I'll look out for that next time. I do agree with you to some extent about Bulvitis - I think his positioning and tendency to get caught on the wrong side of attackers will cost us a goal or two this season, but he does bring other strengths to the team and I'm reasonably content to see him stay in there unless a clearly better alternative emerges. That's right. Posts packed with knowledge and understading, with a big dollop of common sense. Actually not what I said. What I said was look at some Pacific Island internation footballers (as some New Zealander sides have done) and try and get who would be decent, preferably in the defence or forward line. PSV were trying to do this when they tried to sign Roy Krishna.

I've heard the name yes, have you checked into there?

Your constant calls for the same players to be dropped all the time is getting boring. Why bother? Were you not one of the posters who constantly called for Lionel to be dropped? That's a little boring is it not? Why bother? The thread is there to show what you do, but some people seem to think it's called "Butcher's Team Prediction". BTW you also seem very eager every week to shoot down others formations and line ups when you don't like it. Bit boring isn't it?

I had a brain wave recently about something else Scottish teams have never really done. Look at the likes of Argentina, Brazil and a few of the other South/Central American countries's lower league players. Have a look at people from places like the Brazilian Division 2 and things like that. I believe some Asian teams have done this. Some of these guys may come and chances are would probably be of a decent quality and bring some much needed Latin flair to the Caley Stadium. Also if you look at most of the Faroe Islands teams, they all seem to have a couple of Brazilians, so climate can't be a turn off. This has sort of been done before a couple of times. A young Ronaldiniho nearly went to St Mirren apparently and Gretna managed to get that Uruaguayan bloke Yantorno. Thoughts.

IIRC he was a regular player for ICT, then was hit with a bad injury and was out for quite a while. When he came back he only seemed to be on the bench, with Brewster and then Charlie Christie seemingly having him out of favour. CC then loaned him out to Hamilton or somewhere, and wasn't offered a new contract. Disappeared for a few years playing for some smaller lower league Spanish sides. Over the last couple of years he went on trial with Bournemouth but they didn't rate him. Came to ICT, Brewster thought he was good but didn't offer him a contract and then went on trial with County. County felt he was a good player but felt they already had enough similar players, touting then new signing Richie Hart as one of them.

Notice the thing with the whole "England won in 66!" thing, ICT supporters time and again, on here and other places go on about the famous ICT victories. It's obviously not to the scale of winning the World Cup, but all teams have famous victories which they go on about to this day. Just ignore it. I do.

Because this defensive style will only hold for so long. Also, every time I've seen Stratford (both home league games and the two cup ones against Albion and Stranraer), he's been useless. McBain is far better round there. He might be getting on a bit, but he could still put in a better shift than Stratford. I'm no fan of Duncan at all, but I'd even have him instead of Stratford. Bulvitis is another one. Might have some games where he's alright but not the answer in the long run IMO. Desperately needing a Dods/Mann type in there next to Munro. Seems too clumsy for my liking and should Butcher stick with him for the rest of the season which I predict he will, I won't at all surprised to see a good number of own goals/penaltys being given away by him. Eagle's another. Exactly what does he add to the team? He might have a good cross but he can't do much else. Awfully one footed as well. ICT desperately need a right winger as well I reckon.

Why thank you. I'm think I've done quite too recently.

--------------------------------------Esson----------------------------------------------- -----------Tokely---------------------Munro--------------------Golabek---------------- ---Hayes------------------Cox----------------------McBain--------------Djebi-Zadi--- -------------------------------------Sanchez--------------------------------------------- ------------------------Barrowman------------------Foran------------------------------ Subs - Allison, Eagle, Proctor, Rooney, Bulvitis Once again I believe I decent attacking football is needed to win the league. Esson as always in goal. Three across the back of Tokely, Munro and Golabek. Tokely should again try forward runs but stay back when Golabek does so, the same goes for Golabek. Munro is in there to do what he has done best this season and hold it all together the best he can, often playing as a sweeper/libero sort of role, clearing things up at the back. Hayes is on at right midfield so he can charge down the wings as well as cutting inside to shoot with his left. Cox is in the centre to play the ball to the wings, along with McBain. Cox should also move over a little to the right should Hayes cut inside for a possible cross. McBain should also hang back a little when Golabek or Tokely go forward. Once again I'm make a call to re-introduce Lionel Djebi-Zadi but in an attacking position. I would have him in a position, where should he make a blunder there would be enough players behind him to recover. Having him charging forward using his size and speed would cause a heck of a lot of trouble for the opposing full backs. ICT should try and play as wide as possible moving the ball the wings for Hayes and Djebi-Zadi to run forward with it, crossing from the line. Sanchez should sit just infront of the midfield and move forward with Barrowman and Foran when on the attack. Foran needs someone to feed off when up front and I believe trying Barrowman up front with him (with Sanchez sitting just behind) would be very beneficial. When defending corners, Sanchez and Barrowman should stay forward as much as possible and when defending corners, Munro and possibly Golabek and/or Cox or McBain staying back as well. On the bench is Allison, Proctor (if someone is injured at the back or in the midfield, or if ICT are defendiing a slight lead with little time left), Eagle, Rooney and Bulvitis. The main tactic on the whole would be keep the ball down as much as possible, playing it to the wings.

HT - Airdrie 1-2 ICT FT - Airdrie 2-2 ICT Airdrie 1st scorer - Gemmil ICT 1st scorer - Foran Attendance - 1,276

I'd happily give up the League Cup, Alba Cup and the rest of the diddy cups to ensure ICT won the league.

No Lionel or McBain on the bench.

Sorted it for ya Naeballs. B) this is no where near lionels level and we all no that. I hink grant munro is a top quality first division player but not a good spl player. Before anyone has a go im not trying to cause trouble just interested as i like him as a player

I happen to think that mixing up the words "done" and "down" is cringe worthy. Do you really feel the need to exact your revenge on these forums because 90% of your posts are notable for their cringeworthyness and folks revel in the delight of letting you know exactly how much? I wouldn't say 90% of my posts are cringeworthy. Most are well thought out, factfull posts all in all topped off with a big dollop of common sense.

Can someone fill me in here. Which captain swore at which fans at the end of the game?

Agreed, there was a couple inparticular where it was just getting cringeworthy. Well done CaleyD for shutting that garbage done....shoulda been done long ago I reckon.

------------------------------------Esson--------------------------------------------- ---Tokely--------------Duff-------------------------Munro--------------Golabek--- ---------------Hayes----------------Cox-------------------Djebi-Zadi-------------- --------------Sanchez------------Barrowman-----------------Foran---------------- Subs - Allison, Ross/Duncan, Rooney, Bulvitis, McBain/Eagle Esson in goal obviously with Tokely slotted into right back and keep Golabek at left back. Munro stays in again with Duff coming in instead of Bulvitis. I favour an attacking 4-3-3 with Cox in the middle, pinging the ball wide to either Tokely or Hayes down the right or Golabek or Lionel down the left. Hayes should try to stick to the line when ever ICT are on the attack for crosses into the box. Djebi-Zadi comes back in and for my liking would do much better in an attacking position where he can use his size and pace to get down the flanks and attack the oppositions full-backs. Also puting him at left midfield would mean that also if he were to have a blooper, there would be enough players back to cover him. Sanchez, Barrowman and Foran as the attacking front three. I've noticed recently that ICT are far too defenceive when in comes to set pieces. When defending a corner, Sanchez should stay forward at all times with either Foran or Barrowman going about half way back. When ICT have a corner, Munro or Golabek or both should stay back leaving the height and presence of Djebi-Zadi, Tokely and Duff to go forward into the box.