ALSY

3-2

12 man Inverness do it again... :D Hope fully still four points clear for the trip to Cappielow.

Brilliant. Sounds like Dundee and County are really up for it, so we need this win.

Game on. Fantastic.

Ten men behind the ball from Raith and ICT looking ineffective in their attempts to break them down, according to Top Six Next year at the game. A bit worrying considering we only managed one against Morton when they employed the same tactic. 2-0 Dundee :)

You dont really believe that do you ? I think it's far healthier to believe that than adopt the mindset of some some bleating, toy-throwing old firm fans who attribute all their team's failings to a refereeing conspiracy. Sure, most referees will support a team, like anyone else, but most people manage to put their hobbies aside when they are at work.

Surprised no-one's mentioned Derek McInnes in Scotland. In England, Chris Hughton.

Ironic, given that Govey was a top boy in the ASC during the Fergie era and was at Sid Savoy's right hand in the legendary taking of Muirton Park in 1986.

Nah, Rene just prefers to lurk outside it with a pin...

These were more or less my thoughts. In August I assumed we'd have a very mediocre season and finish fourth or fifth and though Butcher would just see out his contract. I never had any faith in us going up in thr first place and so never saw any need to call for Butcher's head around December when things weren't going particularly well. Turns out I misjudged Terry Butcher and the players, and even if we don't make it up this season I think they've done a great job.

I have a feeling Dunfermline will take something off us. They're a decent side, Gibson sounds like he's on great from and they'll feel they deserve something more from us this season. Given our goal difference, though, we can afford to drop two points and still go up even if County win every game. My only other worry - similar to a lot of people's - is that we drop points in one of the clearly winnable games: Raith or Morton. If we do that then the team might start to feel the fear a bit and teams like Queens and certainly Dunfermline are good enough to take advantage of that.

We're in such a strong position now. Because of the goal difference we can afford for Dundee to win one and draw one more than us and still finish ahead of them. County are still the biggest worry. Maybe jumping the gun a bit, but I really really really really hope we're in a position to win the league at Somerset. Imagine that terracing with 1000+ victorious ICT supporters on it at full time?

Feck me. Just got in from horrible day at work to this. Unbelieveable... ...and now 2-0 to the pars. Football isn't supposed to be this painless. What's going to go wrong? Heh. St Johnstone beating Rangers 3-1 too.

:D :D Nothing to do with not caring, Don - I'm just saving my fingers for celebrating all the goal updates coming in tomorrow on the matchday thread...

I know quite a few of the away regulars but very few who go to home games, so I had to go to a couple of games on my own at TCS last year. It was absolutely fine - once you look around you soon realise that there are plenty of others in the same situation. During an exciting game you might end up exchanging comments with a few of the people around you - frustration or excitement tends to make people more garrulous - but otherwise there's no pressure to be sociable: no-one will be looking at you strangely simply because you're on your own. Arrive just before kick-off to minimise standing-around time and take a radio or an ipod to kill time during half-time. Seriously: there's no need to feel self-conscious and even though you might feel at a bit of a loose end for a while, all that will evaporate as soon as the game starts.

I'm going to be ?20 richer at the end of the season Alternative Maryhill! Hopefully you'll be handing me a crisp purple note away at Ayr... If we win the league at Ayr I'll have the ?20 served to you on a bed of black rose petals in a diamond-encrusted casket, and be happy to do so...

I didn't believe we would do it. There seemed to be too many things stacked against us: the level of investment in Dundee, the fact that no team has bounced straight back to the SPL after relegatrion for about a decade, and the fact that Butcher tried to overhaul the team quite substantially at the start of the new season. I still don't quite see us as favourites to go up, although that might change if we beat County on Tuesday, but whtaver happens I think the team and management have already exceeded my fairly low expeectations for this season.

I've gone Foran; Rooney; Tokely, but it was a really hard choice today: it feels wrong not giving anything to Duncan, Cox or Golly. Nice dilemma to have though.

It's a combination of things, I think, most of which have been covered above, but the single biggest thing is that the team has had to learn how to play in this league. Today, in the first half in particular, the players looked far more aggressive and determined to be first to every ball that they did at the start of the season. Butcher has had to accept that his initial judgements about certain players and about his best line-ups were wrong, and he deserves a great deal of credit for doing so before it was too late. Certain players also seem to have developed greater self-belief as the season has gone on - Rooney is the most obvious example, but I think Foran is also playing better than he has ever played for us before, and both Duncan and Cox have been inspirational in the past few weeks.

First half was as good as we've been all season. What a difference Foran makes - he won everything in the air and engineered a couple of great shots for himself that would have been spectacular goals if it hadn't been for Jonny Tuffey. Rooney put in a tremendous shift too: he chased everything and produced some really intelligent set-up play as well as tajking his headed goal really well. Cox and Duncan in central midfield were excellent again and Tokely looked solid and commanding at centre half. Eric was our only ineffective player: he just wasn't making the right runs and also has a terrible tendency to avoid putting any pressure on opposition players. a lot of the time he just seemed to float around while all our other players were chasing and harrying everything. Partick were much better second half and that frustrating tenedency we have had all season to relinquish control of games kicked in again. We sat back too much and although we had chances, we could have thrown it away as we lived dangerously at times. The defence stayed pretty solid in the end, through, and although Foran looked flat out after about 70 minutes he kept fighting, and Dani was far more effective in possession that Eric had been when he came on. Great support today - 300-400 at a guess, singing throughout, and there were memorable moments when Tokely came straight to the away end after the final whistle, and Terry punched the air as the away support chanted "We are top of the league". It's a relief in a way that I won't make the game on Tuesday - the nerves couldn't go through that again.

Meeting Top Six... and a couple of others at Kelvinbridge tube just after one. In the past we've tended to go to the Pewter Pot on North Woodside Road (dcent pub but a bit dead) or the Landsdowne on Landsdowne Crescent, but we'll maybe give Munn's a whirl this time and see you there.

As I can't make the Highland March, I've decided to walk this one. I think I'd better set out on Friday evening to be on the safe side. If I can make the Elephant and Bugle for around midnight I'll jemmy open the cellar doors and strike camp for the night there, then set out bright and early with a view to being at the Pewter Pot for lunchtime. I will attach a sponsorship form on a separate thread.

Heroic defending from Queens in the last half hour - Dundee looked far better after the equaliser. Still a good night for us though. Guess I should be saying well done to County. I really hope they're not going to emulate our 2003-04 season though...

Or not! WTF happened there?

R they not playing Dundee on Sat.? Oops.. hadn't checked that. If it stays 1-1 in the Dundee game, though, then I think a Dundee win is potentially less harmful than a County win, given County's games in hand? Guess a draw would be the best result for us though. Bloody hell... County are going through!