DoofersDad

Been away for a few days so this is my first chance to say a heartfelt "well done" to Kenny Cameron and the Board for taking the right decision and putting the integrety of the game before short term financial considerations. I was just delighted to hear the news. But next season will not be easy. The club cannot afford to pay the sort of wages to attract and keep the sort of players we would like to see playing at the TCS so if we want to see the club progress we need to get behind the club and keep supporting the team through thick and thin. There have already been several excellent posts pledging support but we need folk to come through the turnstiles week in and week out and we need those who spent most of last season knocking the club to get behind the team and give them encouragement. The club has given its support to the fans. Now it is time for us to get behind the club and give it our support through the coming season.

I'm with the OP here. The chips are down for Rangers and the Ramsden cup is the plaice for them. Let's hope someone gives them a battering.

There's no easy answer to who should go up but as we've argued with Rangers, entry to SPL should be on merit. Perhaps the 2 sides should have a play off at Hampden.

There's an unused ground in Glasgow they could use. I understand the owners would welcome a bit of rent money.

Don't know about others but I was very disappointed with Kenny Cameron's statement. To me there seemed to be a clear message that whilst the strong feeling of supporters was acknowledged, this was to be first and foremost a business decision on what the Board consider best for the club and Scottish football. It sounds as though the Board has been listening too much to Green who has asked Boards to make a business decision when they vote on July 4th. Let's be clear. This is not about business. Business is about making money and giving shareholders a return on their investment. Since when have any shareholders in ICT ever expected a return on their investment? Shareholders in ICT have put money into the club to help bring a standard of football to Inverness that they and the rest of the paying public want to see. Our return on investment is entertainment and hopefully success on the park. There will be no entertainment if ICT play Rangers newco because nobody will be there to watch the game. It may be that the Board is persuaded that an SPL without Rangers will not be in the best financial interests of the club, but so what? If that is the case then it will be the responsibility of the Board to cut expenditure to match any loss in revenue. That is a small price to pay to behave in a principled way by saying "no" to a newco that has absolutely no right to a place in the SPL. I was also very disappointed to hear that there had been a full and frank exchange of views in discussions between the club and the Supporters' Trust. That suggests that there were clearly differing views. But why were there discussions in the first place? There is nothing to discuss. Rangers newco is a club that has never played a game of football in its existance. It must start at the bottom like we and everybody else did. We expect the club to vote "no" and we expect the club to make an official statement to that effect in the near future.

After all the nonsense posted on here by some, it is good to hear that he has put pen to paper and the speculation can end. It sounds as though he has a good attitude and hopefully he will be a very useful addition to the squad. Welcome Gary and good luck.

So presumably if Kilmarnock win a place in Europe they will pass it over because the travelling will be a bit too much for them?

The article posted by Gabby takes some reading but is worth the effort if my understanding is correct. My reading is that by having the meeting on 4th July the SPL is taking a position that oldco and newco are one and the same but just with different ownership to transfer the SPL share to. If it is the same club then they can also take sanctions against them. But oldco and newco are not the same club, they are different legal entities and therefore a meeting on a differernt basis should be taking place which would require a vote of 10 clubs rather than 8 to approve the newco SPL entry. Either way it strikes me as irrelevant. If they were one and the same then appropriate sanctions for the financial history would mean the club should be thrown out of the SPL whilst if it is a newco they do not have the playing history to justify admission. Either way, there is simply no justification for allowing Rangers in. The meeting of 4th July should not be to decide whether Rangers newco get the share, it should be about which other club gets it instead. What is disappointing here is the silence of other SPL clubs including our own. They should be taking a collective stand and say emphatically that they are all voting "no". That might allow everyone to know where they stand and we can move forward. This just gets messier and messier. It would not surprise me if Green applies for an injunction to delay the start of the SPL season if the vote goes against him. Were that to happen, would the SFL play its fixtures to include the team which would be in the SPL if it were going ahead? The possible scenarios don't bear thinking about. It is time for a united and decisive stand from the so called leaders of the Scottish game. Kick Rangers oldco into the history books and Rangers new co into division 3 - and do it soon.

Dear Mr Cameron, I am writing to urge the representatives of Inverness Caledonian Thistle Football Club to vote against any proposal to allow a Rangers newco entry into the SPL on July 4th. I am sure the club is well aware of the views of fans and the wide range of valid arguments being aired on CaleyThistleOnline and therefore I will restrict myself to a few points which I feel are particularly pertinent. The wrong doing of Rangers is without precedent. The scale of the financial irregularity and debt is on a scale unseen before in Scottish football and must be punished severely. Of course, I understand the argument that any application is about the newco and not the old regime and therefore legally the newco is not responsible for its wrong doings. But equally, the newco must not be allowed to benefit from the status in the league which the old club had – a status which was achieved by financial practices which have left a tax debt of millions and dozens of creditors penniless. It might be interesting to consider just where Rangers might be if they had acted responsibly in clearing their debts. If, instead of buying players they could not afford and paying them inflated wages, they put income towards paying their taxes and companies who had provided services to them, then their playing staff would have been much less competitive. Who is to say they would have survived in the SPL in that situation? So why should the club (yes, I know technically it is a new club but we all know it is still Rangers) be rewarded with a place in the SPL because of its appalling behaviour when it might be playing at a lower level had it acted responsibly? A Rangers club has no right to be in the SPL. A place needs to be earned just as this club has earned its place and our local Highland neighbours have earned theirs. Other clubs also work hard and honestly to reach this level and it would be offensive in the extreme to see a newco Rangers with no history gifted a place on the back of the old Rangers former position in the league. Entry to the SPL should be on merit and as Rangers newco has no record of winning a single game of football, then any application should not even be considered for a vote. It should simply be thrown out as being frivolous. To my mind these arguments are strong, but we keep hearing arguments that other clubs will not survive without Rangers. This is scare****ering nonsense on several levels. There will be some loss of revenue but there will be more interest in a league without Rangers and that in turn will bring in additional revenue. In addition, if Rangers are admitted to the league many fans will simply lose their faith in the game and the club and will stop going or will attend fewer games. I for one will certainly not attend matches involving a Rangers newco if they are admitted. It is difficult to be sure what the financial consequences will be but clubs survive fine in the SFL without Rangers and Celtic and it is for clubs to manage their affairs appropriately and in line with the income stream they get. If the Board cannot manage that, they should make way for a Board that can. But this is not a financial issue. It is an issue about the principles which are important in sport. It is an ethical issue. Whichever club is elected to the SPL they must be elected on merit. That cannot be a Rangers newco and if the club votes for them then it will be, by far, the most shameful day in our club’s history. Please, Mr Cameron, vote “no”.

Nothing to do with jumping ship. If you read all the posts of those with the same opinion as myself you'll see that, if sporting integrity is not upheld and the newco forced to apply the the SFL, then we are turning our back on football. As I've said on a few post I cannot bring myself to support a sport that allows lawbreaking and tax dodging to go unpunished. If I dont pay my taxes I'll be severely punished. The same must apply to any business. I don't think I would go as far as Alex but I have some sympathy with the point of view. For me loyalty needs to be earned and I will not blindly support the club regardless of how it behaves. If the club votes for Rangers newco to be admitted to the SPL then as far as I am concerned they will have lost any right to expect me to support the club through thick and thin. To be honest, I don't really know what I will do but I guess I will stop being a fan and become someone who watches games of football from time to time for purely selfish reasons. What I do know is that if the club does vote to admit Rangers newco to the SPL it will be the darkest day in the history of the club and I will be disgusted with them.

Rumour has it we are going to play at Nairn ....on the beach.

Think positive. What ever the reason it gives fans a bit more time to get their letters into their Boards telling them that under no cir***stances should they be voting to let a newco in. No excuse for not not writing. To paraphrase Bob Geldof: Write your ****ing letter NOW!

England are to play Scotland in a friendly to mark the 150th anniversary of the FA. Detail in BBC report. http://www.bbc.co.uk...otball/18476089 Let the hype begin!

Football-wise and financially I think the Germans will put them in their place

Speak for yourself

Would a restructuring provide an excuse to allow Rangers newco in? It seems absurd to try and rush things through for this coming season and would be unfair on teams in the SFL who would not have been aware that for the last quarter of last season they would, in effect, have been playing for a place in the top tier. It would be fine for those who suddenly find themselves promoted but they will still be at a relative disadvantage as they will not have planned pre-season with SPL in mind. Surely just another wind up.

What's the plan? Do the 11 players play in different positions each match to see which they're best in?

I would think there would also be a lot of SFL teams very unhappy about a Rangers Newco going straight in to the SPL. They currently get no benefit from Rangers being in the SPL but with Rangers not being admitted there is a better chance for them to get into the SPL until Rangers rise through the ranks and reassert themselves in the top flight. It will be very much to their financial advantage for Rangers to join at the bottom of the SFL. I also am sceptical about the warnings of financial problems for others in a SPL without Rangers. Surely this greatly increases the chance of others to win a European place and that can only add interest to the Scottish game. It has been boringly predictible for years. Now there is a chance for someone else to come 2nd and that might encourage better players to sign for the also rans of the SPL and the SPL to become more competetive as a result.

The Chairmen must vote against Rangers NewCo being admitted into the SPL. Caley D has eloquently laid out the reasons on another thread making the point that both Dundee and Falkirk have submitted valid applications within the time frame required. But for me there is a further important reason - one of precedent. If Rangers NewCo were accepted into the SPL it would be for one reason only - money. It would mean that the SPL chairmen felt that admitting Rangers NewCo would be to the financial advantage of other clubs in the SPL and therefore they would be admitting them for a reason other than merit. Currently, teams are admitted on merit with the team that wins the SFL gaining promotion. If Rangers NewCo were to be admitted, not on merit but because of the potential financial advantage they bring to the other member clubs, then what happens next year when Cowdenbeath romp to the first division title with Dundee a distant 2nd? Do the SPL chairmen admit Dundee rather than Cowdenbeath on the basis that they will bring more money into the SPL than Cowdenbeath? Admission must be as a result of merit and not of what is, to all intents and purposes. bribery.

Sorry DD but that's not what posters have said. It hasn't been a case of "don't get too excited" but definitely more "he's not good enough". Oddquine has very eloquently pointed this out and I'm certainly in her camp regarding giving these players a chance. Nobody's seen this guy play, but several posters claim he's not good enough - on what basis? OK he's a late starter, but that might just mean no-one's noticed him as he's not been in the shop window. Isn't that the same as the Hull striker Steve Bull, who hit the headlines with a late starting career - and then went on to play for England! I'm with Oddquine. Give the new guys a chance, don't write them off before you've seen them play, and don't p*ss them off by writing negative drivel that they might read before they've played (or even signed). Positivity can breed success, but negativity will certainly breed failure. I think you need to go back over this thread and read the posts again. I think only KenCar said he wasn't good enough and if you read his post it is pretty clear he meant it not in a literal sense as he, like the rest of us, have not seen the lad play, but in the sense that in general we would not expect players playing in struggling conference sides to be what an SPL club is looking for. Read ICT Paisley's excellent post at number 68 for an example of a more considered view of the news. And who is not for giving the boy a chance? It's not that people aren't prepared to give him a chance, it is just that some of us don't have unrealistic expectations of him. The lad himself has talked about the move being an opportunity to advance his career so I hardly think he is going to p*ssed off by supporters who wish him luck but feel he will have to prove himself. What may well p*ss him off is people such as yourself and Oddquine who seem to have such low expectations of what this club needs that he will be thinking he's taking a backwards step by coming here. What I do agree with you is that positivity can breed success, but negativity will certainly breed failure. The question is who is being positive and who is being negative here? I explained in my post why not getting excited over Warren's potential signing is a positive stance to take. I can think of few things so negative as meekly accepting that signings of players with no particular track record from struggling conference sides is the future for an SPL side.

What folk are saying is that we should not get too excited about a player whose only full time football has been with a club that finished 19th in the conference and who, incidentally, has actually not signed for us yet. Terry may have unearthed a real gem and I am sure that if he signs we will all wish him well. But I don't think it is being negative at all to suggest that those who appear to think that this signing will be our ticket to European glory should tone down their expectations. With regards to Tokely, he was 17 when he signed for us and we were in Division 3. There is no comparison. We are an SPL side and fans would like to think that one year we will have enough success to win a domestic trophy and get a shot at European football. Signing players from the lower reaches of the conference does not fill me with expectation that this success will come next season. That is not being negative, it is being realistic. The manager will sign who he signs. Hopefully the new signings and those already here will gel into a good unit which will help bring the fans in and we can build from there. I will support the team whatever it is but reserve the right to voice my views on this forum and elsewhere if I feel the manager is not making decisions which are in the best interest of the club. I think that's a positive thing to do.

I'm far too worried to think about panicking.

What is it with this attitude that if you post something critical or even just express a bit of concern the suddenly you are not a supporter of the club? It's nonsense. Most of those who are expressing their concens on this forum are doing so because they support the club and want it to do well. It seems some folk have lost touch with reality here and any difficulties that they might acknowledge are attributed to the financial position of the club and therefore somehow we are not entitled to be concerned about it. Let's look at just a coulpe of crucial positions in the side - central defence and striker. In central defence we have now let go or lost (however you want to spin it) 2 experienced and long serving central defenders who now play for a rival SPL club. As replacements we have a defender who suffered a serious injury last year and we really do not know how he will fare next year. Other players brought in to that position last year have left (so much for rebuilding) and the position is so desparate that folk are getting terrribly excited by a player who has played 3 seasons with Newport County who finished 19th in the Conference last season. And he hasn't even signed yet. Up front we have a striker who scored just 3 goals in 24 games and another (Shinnie) who, whilst he looked promising before sustaining injury last season is still to prove himself at this level. We made offers to our two leading scorers from last season but were unable to persuade either to stay. Other players have been offered contracts and despite being given a deadline have still to sign. Obviously they would rather be somewhere else too. Butcher promised to rebuild this side. Well he's certainly demolished the old side but where is the new? It's like building a house where you have been given an entry date and turn up a week before you are due to move in and find the roof isn't on yet. But no need to worry, Sir! It's all in hand. It may be that Butcher is the man for the job and will be able to bring in hidden gems from the lower reaches of English football. He has done so before but he has also brought some dross in. But when you compare our squad at the moment with others in the SPL you have to think of us as hot favourites for drop. So, in conclusion. Yes, I am worried but I will still be giving 100% to the team next season.

Fraser Dougal, will you let us know how they get on, please?

Sad day, but if he has been offerred a better deal across the bridge or feels more appreciated by the club there, then good luck to him. He's got a living to make I for one don't blame him. I feel strongly that Butcher made a big mistake to let Munro go and another one now to let Tokely go, but I'll not rant on any more about it. The proof of the pudding is in the eating as they say and it will be fascinating to see what next season brings. I think they are both good enough for the SPL, Terry doesn't. He's the manager and I'm not so I sincerely hope I am wrong and he's right. As I've said before, next season will be the one on which Butcher can really be properly judged. Obviously he will be judged by how well ICT do but he will also be judged by how well those players he judged to be not good enough do. One little word of advice for Terry though. If you're going to play wee Billy up front against Grant and Ross, can we please keep the ball on the deck?