DoofersDad

I think the three poorest players were the three that Foran subbed. Of the OP's choice I put Vigurs and Doumbouya in with Carl Tremendous in my top 3. I think Vigurs comes in for a lot of unfair criticism on this forum and this thread seems particularly harsh. I thought he applied himself very well on Saturday, he got through a lot of work and often retain the ball well when none of his team mates were making themselves available. The manager said he felt Vigurs was "magnificent". Whilst I think that is overstating it, the manager clearly saw much in his performance which others did not. He is one of those midfielders whose role is not spectacular and whose value to the side often goes unnoticed - a bit like Roy McBaian a few years ago. What does frustrate me about Vigurs is that I would like to see him play further forward and be looking to score more. In my view, whilst he is not a striker, he is the most composed finisher in the side. Too often in recent games Doumbouya has been left with no support and we play long balls up to him but have none of the midfield available for a simply lay off. Doumbouya then has to look to either keep possession until someone is available or try and turn the defender. As a result he is more likely to lose possession and then he gets criticised. I think if Vigurs was playing further forward and looking to find space behind the striker he would score a few more. Not only that, but he has the quality to retain the ball and play the weighted passes that create goal scoring opportunities for others.

The manager singled Vigurs out for praise in his post match interview and said he was "magnificent". I think that is stretching it a bit but I certainly thought he played better than for a while and was the pick of the midfield. No way will he be left out for the next game!

I think Doran needs to come in from the start, so it is a question of who to leave out. And it's not an easy choice. It seems you are leaving Vigurs out even though he was probably our most effective starting midfielder on Saturday and Draper was shocking! I'm not sure that Tansey and Draper really work well together in front of the back four and therefore you need to play Draper higher up. That means a choice between Draper and Polworth. Personally I think Polworth has done a little more this season to justify edging Draper out of the team but it's a very close call. It would certainly do no harm leaving Draper out if only to make him realise he needs to be on the top of his game all the time if he is going to retain his place.

OFW Mackay Warren, Meekings, Tremarco Tansey Vigurs Doran, Polworth, King Doumbouya

Good post from Huisdean. I agree with others that it was a poor performance today and that yet again Carl Tremarco was the MOTM. What I don't agree with many on here is on the performances of Vigurs and Doumbouya. I thought Vigurs had a pretty good game and put in a good shift. Doumbouya worked hard all afternoon and whilst he does seem weak in the air, to be fair, he was being continually fouled every time he went for the ball. When it came to him lower, his first touch was very good but the problem for both him and Vigurs was that there was precious little happening in the space between them. Foran was spot on with the three substitutes although I think Mulraney should have been replaced at half time. It was just one of those days when it wasn't working for him and his decision making was poor, twice taking players on and losing the ball when Mckay had gone on the overlap. It was a brave decision to take Draper off but it was the correct one. Draper is usually one of the most dependable players in the side but I can't remember seeing such an anonymous performance from him. Mckay also had a bad day at the office. Doran looked good when he came on and was making himself available for the ball far more effectively than Draper and doing a lot more with it when he got it. He must be close to getting a start, but if he does it is not an easy call to say who drops out and where he would play. Key for me is having players making themselves available for Doumbouya and not leaving him so isolated. It may not have been the greatest game we've ever seen but at least we had 11 attempts on goal which is more than in most matches last season. The big downside for me was the crowd. After getting a big crowd against The Rangers and playing attractive football this season I was expecting the crowd to be close to 3000. We weren't even close to that and there was zero atmosphere.

Haven't looked at the "What Scotland Thinks" website for a while and in looking tonight I notice there was a poll done for the Glasgow Herald and dated 4th October which I can't recall having seen mentioned anywhere before. It puts support for Independence down to 39% ("NO" 47% with 15% don't know). This is the lowest level of support since the 2014 referendum. An interesting point which may well put people off the idea of independence is that if an independent Scotland was part of the EU, Scotland would need to go through the EU in order to get a trade deal with the rUK. The rUK is far and away Scotland's biggest trading partner but yet an independent Scotland would have minimal influence in the EU. So much for independence meaning Scotland would have control over it's own affairs!

A further insight into the SNP's strategy and shameful neglect of the day job was demonstrated in BBC Radio Scotland's morning news programme today. Firstly there was the leader of The Highland Council warning of further cuts to public services as a direct consequence of the SNP Government's continuing squeeze on local government. The SNP berate the Tories for some of their policies and then do much the same in Scotland. They then pass the blame onto the Tories in an attempt to get the people to hate them even more. But let's be clear about this; for all the SNP's whingeing about Tory austerity, the appalling squeeze on local government in Scotland is SNP austerity pure and simple. There was also news of a report from the Royal College of Nursing expressing grave concern about nursing levels. Despite the SNP having been in charge of the NHS in Scotland for the past decade we have vacancy rates for nurses at 4.2% and set to increase due to the number of nurses approaching retirement age. This SNP Government is the very same SNP Government which, during the independence referendum, told the nation that we needed independence to protect the NHS from privatisation. Yet in the past year, this SNP government have increased spending on agency nurses by over 40%. It is pouring valuable public money into the private sector, not to improve the efficiency of the service but simply to plug gaps created by their own staggering ineptitude. Despite being invited to send a spokesperson to discuss the issues, the Government declined to do so. What a devious, hypocritical and incompetent bunch the leadership of the SNP have become

So much for the SNP's "conversation" about independence. No hint of any kind of discussion but yet they press ahead with the next stage in the process of the only thing that interests them. Their case for reneging on their "once in a generation" pledge is that the Brexit vote is a game changer. It is nothing of the sort. Let's just put aside the rhetoric of the SNP and look at the facts. When Salmond called the first independence referendum everyone in Scotland knew that there was a strong body of opinion within the UK that we should leave the EU. Support within the UK for leaving the EU was not much different from the level of support in Scotland to leave the UK. Two important points arise from this. Firstly, if the EU was so important to the SNP they should have pressed the UK Government for a referendum on EU membership before any vote on Scottish Independence was held. This would have allowed the independence referendum to have been held with clarity regarding the UK's position within Europe. Secondly, having opted for a vote against a background of uncertainty, it must have been obvious to anyone who voted to remain in the UK that there was a very real possibility that by remaining within the UK, Scotland could be taken out of the EU in the not too far distant future. The SNP are hardly in a position to complain now that the UK has actually voted to leave the EU, The SNP then bleat on and on about Scotland having voted to remain in the EU. It didn't. This was a UK vote about the UK's position in Europe. In 2014 Scotland voted to remain in the UK and in doing so, Scotland voted to accept the decision of the UK electorate in UK wide votes. Sturgeon has been talking about her "duty" to call a 2nd indy ref if Scotland's demands on EU membership are not met - and she said it with a straight face! Sturgeon's duty is both to accept the will of the people voiced in the 2014 referendum - which her party foisted on us - and, following on from that, to accept the will of the UK electorate in the recent UK referendum. Just as in 2014 when the SNP opted for an independence referendum against a background of uncertainty, the SNP seems hell bent on doing the same again in the light of Brexit. They argue that the UK Government has no plans for a post Brexit strategy as if that somehow justifies a 2nd indy referendum. Rather than engage constructively in the Brexit process and waiting to see what emerges so that people could know what they are voting on, the SNP wants to rush headlong into another divisive and damaging referendum. But, of course, if we are to have a 2nd referendum, the level of uncertainty will be far greater than the uncertainty they are using to justify having it in the first place. At least with the UK Brexit we know what currency we will be using! And how irrational to use the EU as the justification for a 2nd indy referendum! With Scotland's current budget deficit there is no guarantee that the EU would allow an independent Scotland to join. If it did, then the terms of membership are likely to be far less favourable than the UK electorate has just rejected and it is quite possible that the Scottish electorate may not then vote to join the EU on those terms. The strategy of the SNP is clear. They don't care what is best for Scotland and they have no respect for the democratic process. They simply want independence come what may. So they muddy the waters in the hope that they can con enough people into thinking the others are responsible for the uncertainty they are causing and that an independent Scotland would take us away from the uncertainty. Nothing could be further from the truth. A YES vote in a 2nd independence referendum, splitting us from our biggest market (4 times larger than the EU), would plunge the country into a far more uncertain future and the current Scottish budget deficit would result in far greater austerity than we have experienced in recent years. When Sturgeon pledged at the SNP conference that she would do whatever was necessary in the interests of the Scottish people, I thought she was going to announce that she was going to honour her previous commitment to the 1st referendum being a once in a generation event. I should have known better. She simply wants to win independence for Scotland. The interests of the Scottish people don't come into it.

HT 1-0 FT 3-1 ICT Polworth Opp Coulibaly Crowd 2,979

Can't say I agree with that. Stewart has certainly had a good recent spell on the Challenge tour and has risen to 320 on the world rankings but he remains well behind Laird,Ramsay and Warren who are all surely far more deserving. Stewart's current position is a result of a good few weeks only and is way better than he has ever reached before. There really is no way he should be considered for this. showing friendship is fine but this is an event in which players are representing their country. Knox really has a responsibility both to his fellow professionals and to Scottish golf to pick players who have earned the right to represent their country. Knox's pick may be a reaction to his omission from the Ryder Cup and a snub to the establishment, but whatever the reason it really isn't on. Handing a mate a very large pay check at someone else's expense will not make him or Stewart popular with fellow professionals. A far better gesture of friendship would have been to pick someone more deserving and then pay for his mate to come and watch. With the money he has won this year the cost of that would be small change for him.

Overall the league's newcomers were worthy winners and looked to be a pretty decent side. They kept possession well and were always looking to break forward quickly. But we played well too, Defensively we were pretty solid and if truth be told, we created the better chances and created enough to have won the game. Mulraney and Doran both provided a real threat when they came on and will surely get more game time soon. We will certainly play worse this season and win. The difference was in the finishing. Gilt edged chances were missed by our two strikers at either end of the game that you would expect a street league striker to bury. We had other chances but Foderingham was never seriously troubled. At the other end, Fon Williams was called into action a few times from less good chances and Miller's goal was a finish of real quality. It is always disappointing to lose but I hope those "occasional" supporters who helped to get the crowd over 7000 will have enjoyed the game and will come back again. Despite the disappointment of losing it was a thoroughly enjoyable game and a world away from the sterile negative football of last season. It was good to see a sizeable number of fans standing to applaud the team off the field at the end.despite having lost. That didn't happen last season.

HT 0-1 FT 1-2 ICT King Opp Miller Crowd 6,523

We could all hold up the wrappers of our Wherthers Originals. The sunlight reflecting off those golden wrappers should fair put the fear of God into the Hun.

HT 1-0 FT 1-2 ICT Polworth Opp Imrie Crowd 1684

Over the years the subject of what size crowds Caledonian and Thistle used to attract has come up several times. What seems strange to me is that nobody seems to have any actual figures! Presumably there are records somewhere and attendance figures were published in newspapers and perhaps the programmes of the times. I had a quick look on google and could find nothing. I came to Inverness in 1975 and whilst I had no particular allegiance to any of the 3 Inverness clubs, I did attend occasional games of all 3 clubs. My recollection is of of crowds of 3-400 if playing the likes of Keith but at least double that for County and Elgin or for a derby. A big cup game would draw considerably more in the same way that a cup semi-final or final in Glasgow attracts thousands more to watch ICT. Getting a crowd of 1000 plus in the compact stadium at Telford St would provide a good atmosphere which no doubt made it feel that there was a bigger crowd relative to the TCS (which seems to have been designed to suck any atmosphere away from the ground as quickly as possible). But the truth of the matter is that despite any concerns we may have regarding crowd numbers at TCS now, average crowds are way above the levels in the old Highland League days. That doesn't mean we shouldn't look back nostalgically to those days, but it does mean that we should embrace where we are and make the most of the significantly higher level of football we now have the opportunity of watching in Inverness.

What a complete and utter idiot the man is. He had it made with being a popular choice with fans in securing a very lucrative role in a dream job. He was at the pinnacle of his career and yet throws it all away for some shabby "consultancy". His career is down the tubes along with the respect and affection of a nation's football fans. I too have no sympathy for the man but will be intrigued to see what emerges from all this. Big Sam's ego being what it is, he will no doubt no be touting his services on the back of a 100% record as England manager.

I don't think simply expressing a view that it would be good to know what the numbers going through the away turnstiles are is obsessing. Knowing what the numbers are would simply allow for rather more informed comments on crowd numbers which surely must be better than people making comments when they have the facts wrong. I just fail to see what the club has to lose by making the figures public.

Excellent post, Kingsmills. Couldn't agree more. It really is pathetic how various bodies do nothing about the conduct of this odious club and their equally obnoxious followers. As well as the SFA and SPFL, the police take no meaningful action either despite the law being openly flouted. However, it wouldn't surprise me if the BBC's contract did not have the kind of clauses in it which it ought to have. Rather than requiring teams to provide access, interviews etc, it maybe details payments for such access which The Rangers would simply forgo. I can well imagine the SPFL agreeing to such an unsatisfactory contract under pressure from Ibrox. If The Rangers are contractually obliged to provide access to the BBC then the BBC is probably unwilling to take action for breach of contract on the basis that they probably wouldn't then have the contract renewed next time round. The other clubs pussyfoot around the issues because they are worried that meaningful action against the big two would seriously affect revenues. If action is to be taken it will have to be from outside and it would be good to see MSPs do some serious campaigning on this issue. If I am suitably offended when we offer a warm Highland welcome to The Rangers on their first visit here, I just might write to local MSPs to ask them to take up the issue with suitable bodies.

The absence of The Rangers, Hibs and Hearts from the top flight will also have affected our average gates. Not just because they are clubs who always bring a good following, but because they attract more home support to the game than the likes of Hamilton and Kilmarnock do. With The Rangers having made it to the top division this will probably result in our average home gates being up.this season. I'm not sure that the state of folk's disposable incomes is too much of a factor though. Clearly for some individuals it will be, but in general spending has remained very buoyant, and if the continued growth in places to eat and drink in Inverness is anything to go by, a lot of people have enough cash to go and watch a game of footy once in a while. It's just that they choose not to. Even on a like for like basis I accept CaleyD's point that there is a drop in away support (most notably from OTB) to some extent. There are also other factors for individual games such as weather, significance of the game, any promotions etc. What is difficult is to know how the various different factors affect the gates and therefore to judge any specific trend. But I do think there is little doubt that the level of home support has been dropping over the years. It remains to be seen if the new regime will produce a noticeable increase in gates. On the back of losing our first 3 games, the game against St J attracted about 750 fewer fans than the corresponding game last season. The crowd for the Celtic game was 100 up on last year whilst Saturday's game was very slightly down on the corresponding game last year, although, in line with Don's comments, the Dundee away support seemed to be much less than I would have expected. Unfortunately, the club appears to be unwilling to release figures for numbers coming through the away turnstiles. But I genuinely do think that the way we are playing at the moment will bring people through the gates.There are large numbers of people who attend just a small number of games a year and to be honest, the way we played in the last 2 years will not have encouraged them to come back. Things are different now, We have had 4 home games and they have all been open, exciting games. I know we lost to County first up but despite that, I have to admit to actually quite enjoying the game! There has been lots of good football in all the games and it is like chalk and cheese compared to last year. We need to get the message across to others that there is entertaining football on offer at TCS. We may not win anything and we may not achieve top six but it's going to be fun and it's going to be exciting.

A post by Oddquine which I almost agree with! One of the big problems in this country is the dependency culture which has arisen out of the generosity and compassion of our welfare state. Together with that is the attitude of people demanding their rights whilst being seemingly oblivious of their responsibilities within society. And then there are those who simply abuse the system and I could give dozens of examples from my own personal experience. I know Oddquine hates the Tories but I don't think they get the credit they deserve in trying to tip the scales back towards rewarding those who do take their responsibilities seriously whilst providing for those in genuine need. They have also supported some of the poorest in society by significantly increasing the personal allowance and taking huge numbers of low wage earners out of paying tax altogether. They have also enabled the economy in the UK to be one of the strongest and most vibrant in the world and have been effective in creating wealth in a very difficult economic climate. What I don't like about the Tories and why I have never voted for them is that they fail to distribute the wealth created fairly. The disparity between the richest and the poorest in society is too much and it is growing ever wider. A better balance is required. I'm not sure what Oddquine or the left wing political movement in general mean by "equality", but if it means people should be paid the same regardless of the job they do then then equality is clearly a bad thing. Work which is harder, requires more skill, carries more responsibility etc should be rewarded with higher pay otherwise, where is the incentive to do these roles? As Oddquine says, there is a happy medium but the Tories don't see it that way. They would just let market forces rip which is why we see these multi-million salaries in the private sector together with massive bonuses. Corbyn's challenge is to identify a happy medium and to persuade others from left and right that we should work towards that. I think he is an inherently decent and principled man but he has lacked the pragmatism required to compromise. He has struck a chord with large parts of society who have felt disenfranchised by the politics of the last half century. These include the left wing ideologists, the welfare state junkies and the "I know my rights" brigade. These are not the kind of people to compromise but nor is their political message one which will resonate with the public as a whole. Corbyn has his mandate but now he has to persuade those who voted for him that the only way to deliver some of what they want is to compromise and find that happy medium. The biggest mistake Corbyn could make now would be to use his mandate to squash the MPs who have opposed him (and there's precious few left who would consider themselves Blairites!) The reason they have opposed him, despite his popular support within the party, is because from their experience in parliament and local government, they know that success in politics requires compromise. It was interesting watching Liz Kendall on question time this week. She has strongly opposed Corbyn but it is impossible to doubt her passionate desire to make life better for the most disadvantaged in our society. You can sense the frustration she and others like her feel when she knows that for all his fine principled words, Corbyn's obstinacy is making the prospect of a Labour Government less likely. The compromise now needed is for the Parliamentary party to endorse Corbyn's leadership and for Corbyn to embrace their pragmatism and start focussing on political realism rather than political ideology. If he can do that whilst persuading his huge party support to trust him, then he just might do it at the next election.

Decent game but we were not at our best today. After going 2-0 up we lost a bit of urgency and allowed Dundee to get back into the game. Sharper finishing from them could have made the game a lot tighter than it was in the end. It's funny how different folk see the game. Someone near to me was doing his nut about Polworth and what a useless sh*te he was. I thought he had a pretty good game and was the stand out in midfield. Took his goal well after great build up play. Good defensive performance all round but Tremarco was my MOTM. Doran may be short of a yard or two of pace but he looked a class act when he came on. I'd like to see him start with Mulraney held back as an impact sub if needed.

HT 2-0 FT 3-1 ICT Tansey Dundee Loy Crowd 2887

I was expecting more on this on the news today but so far there is nothing new other than a bit of fallout. It really is quite extraordinary and really does require an investigation. It is important to note that both Dugdale and Iain Gray have said that not only did she vote, but there was an indication that the vote had been registered. It is therefore not a case of simply not pressing a button hard enough and therefore genuinely thinking she'd voted when actually she hadn't. Dugdale is either lying or she is telling the truth. If she is lying then she should resign. If she is telling the truth then there needs to be an urgent and thorough investigation. I am not aware that in the history of the Parliament a vote has failed to register when the MSP concerned insists both that they voted and that the system had acknowledged that vote. It seems quite extraordinary that the first time it should happen it happens to the leader of the Scottish Labour Party in a vote when had the vote been recorded the Government would have defeated in a vote of some significance. It is also extraordinary that there seems not to be a process to correct the error. Surely, if an MSP has voted but their vote is not recorded, they should be able to draw that to the attention of the Presiding Officer and have that vote added. It is totally unacceptable that decisions are made despite a majority of members voting against them. Dugdale should ether be jumping up and down today demanding answers or resigning. She seems to be doing neither. I wonder if the strategy here is to try and make Corbyn look dynamic, efficient and electable in comparison.

In such short clips from just one angle it can be difficult to get a proper appreciation of the incident. However, in Gordon's case what is clear is that he had both feet off the ground and he was leading with his foot 3ft off the ground with his studs showing. Intentional or not, it was reckless and a red card without any doubt. Unfortunately I don't think the compliance officer will be able to take any action here. Remember when Celtic vindictively tried to have Meekings punished for his alleged handball in the semi-final, the ruling was that the officials had seen the incident but had adjudged it not to be handball. Whether or not it was a correct decision was not relevant because the role of the Compliance Officer is to deal with incidents which the match officials did not see. Clearly. the ref saw the incident last night as he gave Gordon a yellow card. I absolutely agree that refs are under huge pressure and face abuse when they make incorrect decisions. That abuse will naturally be greatest when the error goes against the clubs with the biggest support and therefore they tend to give those clubs the benefit of the doubt. The concept of the Compliance Officer being empowered to take retrospective action when refs get things wrong is OK so far as it allows a player to be punished with an appropriate ban, but the danger there is that it would make refs even more inclined to chicken out of sending players off. They may think that if it really should have been a red card, the CO will deal with it later. That would not be right in the context of the match and it is important that decisive action is taken during the match so that teams suffer the consequence of the recklessness of their players. Last night, Celtic should have played the entire 2nd half with 10 men. Would it have made a difference to the final outcome? Maybe. Maybe not. What I do know is that Alloa were cheated out of the opportunity of finding out. All it needed was an official sitting in front of a TV monitor to take responsibility for the decision and give a clear steer to the referee through his earpiece. It's all very well criticising referees for some of the dreadful decisions they make, but things are unlikely to improve until referees get meaningful support from the football authorities. Sadly, I can't see that happening any time soon.

I've never been convinced Christie has what it takes to be a top player although he clearly has real talent. One of the problems for him here was that he emerged just as Hughes was taking over and therefore was restricted by a system which put possession before creative flair. Last season, despite alarm and even anger at his departure, we actually did better after he left, and whilst there may be other reasons for that, the fact remains that we didn't really miss him in the context of the type of football we were playing. It would be interesting to see how he played if you replaced him for Vigurs in the current team under Foran's much more positive approach. Had he stayed an extra year with us I firmly believe he would have developed more as a player due to regular match day experience and the confidence that being a key player in a side brings. Yes, he will no doubt get a chance or two to impress at Celtic but unless he immediately shines he will not be able to command a regular starting place. Had he stayed here an extra year and then moved to Celtic, a first team place might have been his to lose rather one to grasp for. At the moment, he is too far down the pecking order at Celtic and for his sake I hope that he is put out on loan to get regular first team football. If he doesn't, then I fear he will become yet another of football's promising youngsters who, for a few short years, get paid a lot of money for playing very little football. He could have been a legend had he stayed here. Instead, in a few years time, I fear he may be Ryan who? to Celtic fans. Here's hoping I'm proved wrong.