Charles Bannerman

That's because in this hyperbolic age, all "sheep meat" tends to be called "lamb"!

Only lawyers "demur"! :015:

In fact was the strip with the very narrow stripes not what they had in the early 90s up to the end, with the last broad black and red stripes immediately preceding that? I remember going to the launch of a Thistle strip in the Haughdale just before the merger and that might have been the narrow black and red one. I have a particular memory that lunch was outstanding but I also recollect a green away strip seeing the light of day on that occasion. That, I believe, might have been Jags' very last away strip and I'll tell you why. I'm sure that was what Mark Mitchell (ultimate Jags Rebel) was wearing on Cup Final afternoon in May 1994 when Brewster scored the only goal of the game for DU v Rangers and the Wickers were demolishing the Jags enclosure and loading it up on a lorry. I was doing interviews about this when a tearful Mark Mitchell, wearing that green away top, came up, wished Academy all the best in their new career in the Highland League, and disappeared along Kingsmills Road.

Now a Hoover mender's shop while Tait Grant's is a restaurant (but iIbet they don't do the best gammon steaks in Greig St..... that's definitely Gordy at the ICT Club!)

Except that there wasn't a Thistle strip for 1994-95!

I agree. Someone has done a very goos job of condensing the while thing. Just perhaps a couple of quibbles I might have. It says that the SFL application was lodged "after" acrimonious warngling,. i could equally argue that this should be "in advance of"! There is also a sort of implication that Telford Street became the new stadium but all in all that is very good indeed, given the extent and complexity of the subject matter.

So short that it might best be merged with the thread that ran a while ago on "oxymorons"? :015:

Tailor to jeweller.... what you might call "diasporate" jobs! :015:

Salvadori's in Greig Street. Wonderful ice cream with the option of raspberry cordial on top. I've said it before on this site, but what a wonderful snapshot old Caleyland Greig Street was. Cushnie's Post Office, the Chemist, Salvadoris, the Coop, Morrisons, Frank Hills, the Caley Club, Jimmy Munros, the paper shop (previously Baddons the bikeshop), Diggar's barber shop which is worth a thread on its own. (As a young Brooman said to me during the merger "Diggar McGillivray is hardly cold in his grave and look at what they're doing to the Caley!")

They do. It's called the Fans' Forum on the Unofficial Website. The only difference is that contribution is open to all takers so the quality is a bit more variable.

Now I'd completely forgotten about that! (The trophy is still in the IRA cabinet though.)

"Black and red" and "Predominantly blue".

Robin Hood, William Tell, Sir Francis Drake, Ivanhoe, Huckleberry Hound, Fireball XL5, Criss cross quiz, Crackerjack (hooray!!), Bill and Ben, Andy Pandy, Magic Roundabout, Bosscat, Swallowsand Amazons, Listen with Mother (OK that was radio), Robinson Crusoe. A golden era of kids' TV.

I too would (albeit from the grave!) be unhappy if the histories of Caley, Thistle or Clach were ever forgotten. Clach of course is still alive (and well) and there is also The Lilywhites book which takes the story up to the 1980s. Alex Main's Caley All The Way also takes that tale particular up to the 1980s and their rermaining decade is very well documented. However there does appear to be relatively little on Thistle. There is the smallish Hub of the Hill booklet, of which there don't sem to be many copies, but little else apart from media coverage. On the other hand that became much more extensive in lattter years, both newspaper and TV. I am intrigued to hear that Catch my Pal had a successful football team! That particular "temperance" (probably in reality "total abstinence") organisation was set up the the original William Anderson of Anderson the bakers (Been doing our best for you since 1892.. remember that on the vans) of Academy Street. Their shop is now Blythswood. Catch my Pal met in premises owned by the Andersons near the baker's shop. Mr. Anderson's son, also William, a World War 1 verteran now also long gone, I believe played for Caley. They were a big Caley family. The original Mr. Anderson's grand daughter was a lifelong Caley fan and also supports ICT. The idea was that you would "catch your pal" as he came out of the pub and entice him along for a dose of religious conversion and alcohol aversion. I would hope that if they had a football team that they would be a bit more "temperate" with the invective which would usually follow that immortal Invernessism "Refareemun!"

Interesting to note that Nairn's Highland League career apparently got off the ground in the manner in which it almost invariably continued! :015:

And presented by the Caley committee to the rebels in a further gesture of appeasement as being like "an old Caley away strip".

TCF... you're not the first person to ask this question (as Messrs Cordiner and Byrne of INE would have told you!) This is horrendously complicated. The colour of the strip was a major sticking point in the merger agreement. The original arrangement for 94-95, at a time when the Caley side were being particularly aggressive, was "predominantly blue" - which meant a Caley strip. Jags threatened to pull out just as the first game was about to be played. This would have sunk the whole venture and league football in invwerness so reasonable concessions were made which kept them in at the 11th hour. One of the effects of these was that in the second season the strip became 25% black and red through vertical stripes. It's been variations on that theme more or less ever since. If you can get a copy of Against all Odds, it's explained in full there.

The interview was published in the Highland News ages ago as part of a series also including Charlie and Doc.

TBB... we learn something every day! I had always thought that the tower was part of the original Citadel and hadn't realised it was an 18th century creation. By the way, it has been suggested that it was the presence of Cromwell's garrison in the town in the 1650s which has led Invernessians to speak the most pure English in the lend. Righ'eenuffmun. Yersee'en it!

Given that it's 72 years since Citadel folded, there must be very few, if any, former players left. The only one I ever met was Dodo Sinclair's dad Butch. I had arranged to get an interview with him but unfortunately he died before we could get it done. Interview material with Citadel veterans would be like gold dust but they'll by now be as rare as Old Contemptibles and I think the opportunity has gone. One of my earlier interviews I did for the BBC around 1985 was with an old chap Davie Goodall who had played for Clach when Noah was in nappies. I think it was before WW1. That was an interesting morning. My father lived on the Shore as a boy until 1932 and remembered Citadel, but again I never got round to talking to him about it in depth. I have a FEELING, but am prepared to be corrected, that Citadel's ground may not have been very far behind Cromwell's Tower.

I have a habit of missing some of the big moments. I couldn't make the Airdrie game because of family commitments, I couldn't make Celtic Park on 8.2.00 for practical reasons..... and I didn't go to watch Jags v Killie in 1985 because I reckoned the Jags didn't have a snowball's! Thistle 0 Caley 1 in the League and Caley 0 Thistle 3 in the Q Cup, both in 1988, were, I believe, watersheds in the pre SFL football history of Inverness and I was at both of them. I also made the St. Johnstone game in 1992, Tannadice in 1996, both cup semis and the replay in 2003 and 2004, the Challenge Cup Final in 2003 and the St. Johnstone game in 2004. Come to think of it... I've maybe not done too badly after all..... :003:

Smee.. that's what I mean. 108 has conveniently ignored one of Caley's most embarrassing moments by making the rather unnatural stipulation of "league".

You seem conveniently to have forgotten the 1988 Qualifying Cup replay at Telford Street. Caley 0 Jags 3. :blah01: :blah01: The Airdrie game must have been a great night. I really regret having to miss it.

Given that it was in 1950, you're probably the only person who can! DJS... these smells were so memorable. I don't know what Tokely embalms himself in before games but the whiff of it as he ran past me to warm up on Saturday took me right back to changing trooms in the 1960s. I doubt if it was the horse linament of these days though. Ther other abiding smell of the Caley Park was that of pies drifting out of the tunnel just before half time. It was perhaps the subtle blend of pies and horse linament (hopefully from separate sources!) which was particularly distinctive. Oh, and also whisky fumes of the entire gamut of vintages from seconds ago to the previous night as you walked through the packed Howden End. In the days when the Distilleries were still there you could add them in too.

And was the "Michelin Man" shouting "Get off ma f*****g pitch!"?