Caley Mad In Berks

Yet another goal from an attack on our right. Raven should be in there.

Disappointed not to see Raven start. Thought he'd earned a recall from his display against Dons.

Well, I'll give our new manager credit for his half time team talk! Great fight back, and even 'what might have been' if Draper's great header had gone in at 2-4 down. But the second half performance doesn't make up for our complete capitulation after Meekings' crazy mistake for the first goal, after we had been well on top possession-wise at that point. We were just torn apart by Aberdeen's direct style of play in the latter stages of the first half. Poor defending for most of the goals. I thought Warren could have done better for the second goal, and Doran was to blame for the third, losing the ball too easily in the middle of the park. Maybe its just me, but I always think we look a better side with Raven playing. All these recent clean sheets probably prove me wrong, but I don't like Shinnie at right back. Don't know why Ross was hooked. I'd have had Doran off. I think he has been a passenger most of this season. If I'd written this at half time, I'd have been much more critical of much of the team. But I'm encouraged by the spirit shown in the second half, which I hope will continue, so I'm prepared to wait and see how we do in the next few games, before being super critical of some of the individual performances. I had four local friends watching this game with me. All of them thought that the football played by both sides was pretty good at times. Not a bad advert for Scottish football.

I'd love to see Lennon go there, only to be binned by the mad Malaysian a few months down the track!

I thought Clarke's sacking was harsh, particularly after how well he did for WBA last season. But I suppose we should not be surprised by anything that happens in the total rat race which English football, particularly at the top level, has become. I've always maintained that foreign ownership, especially 'absentee' owners' is bad for the long term health of the game. Clarke won't be the only one in the next few weeks. I don't fancy AVB's chances after today's result!

These stats on the game don't look great! Maybe we'll nick one 'against the head', if you don't mind rugby terminology. Come on lads, let's see Yogi off to a good start.

The more I hear/read about Hartley, the better I like him. If it happens, I'll be OK with him as manager.

Brilliant. Sounded like the lads showed a bit of bottle tonight to come back from a goal down to a United side who have been in a bit of form of late. Glad it didn't go to penalties though! Onwards and upwards for the semi, and final!

Maybe one of my fellow 'oldies' can verify this. I seem to remember 'Joopie' Mitchell netting 10 for Caley back in the early 50s.

How disappointing was that? We certainly shaded the first half. Perhaps its just as well we were not a couple of goals up at half time. Just imagine how peed off we'd we feeling now? Must say I thought their pitch looked great despite the atrocious weather. So much better than last season. Uncle Roy must have spent a bit of money on it, and got himself a decent groundsman.

Eagle4Caley. I agree pretty much with your assessment. That's how it looked to me too, watching on TV. Sometimes watching on TV does not give a completely accurate view of a player's performance as the camera only tends to follow the ball, so I can understand people who actually were at the game sometimes having a different opinion. I'll be watching the County game on TV too, with a few pals at my golf club. One of them is a keen Palace supporter! I promise not to rib him too much about last night's result.

How on earth did we lose that? OK , one shocking decision where it is clear that the officials didn't know the rules, and another where their keeper clearly 'bought' the free kick. But even taking these into account, we had enough pressure in the second half to win this game easily. Only bright spot in a miserable afternoon was Watkins coming on and looking the part. Surely he will start now, at least until Vincent is back.

It is good to see an improvement in Scotland's fortunes over the last few games, under Strachan (despite his obvious averseness to selecting ICT players- for example, he had every chance to select G Shinnie instead of the Motherwell guy as a late replacement in this last match.) Perhaps even we might entertain thoughts of qualifying for the World Cup finals next time around. If so, I'm sure some of us will harbour thoughts of actually winning it! (Memories of "I'm on the march with Ali's army" come flooding back! For Scottish fans on this forum, if you could only have one wish come true, between Scotland winning the World Cup, or ICT winning the Scottish Cup, which would you choose? Despite being Scottish through and through, I'd pick ICT. Realistically it is a much more likely scenario as well. Any thoughts?

I hope we have another penalty taker lined up! Don't want to see McKay with that role again.

Ross County and Brora Rangers sounds like a good one. Between them they have about as many ICT players as we have!

Another great win. I'm glad to hear that Josh Meekings had another good game. I'm convinced he will end up at a really big club. Just a couple of weeks ago, at Reading Golf Club I was introduced to a guest called Barry Hunter, an ex Reading player, who was described as Liverpool's chief scout. I 'Googled' him when I got home to check, and he is! He was very professional when I asked if he had his eye on any of our players, and wouldn't be drawn about specific names. However, for my money it would be Meekings, even ahead of McKay. Let's wait and see.

Alas, Shinnie didn't get on even though Birmingham used all 3 subs, so it would appear he is well down the pecking order at the moment. Even Reading's new boy, Billy Sharp, didn't get on. Mind you, there was no need for him as Reading's big Russian up front, Podrebnyak, played very well. I spent much of the game on my phone checking up on ICT's match, so I left the ground with a smile on my face, just like all the Reading fans around me. They were not to know it was for a different reason!

Maybe so, but out of Birmingham's last 5 matches (including Capital One cup), Shinnie has started in only 2, and been on the field for less than 1 hour in each of them. In the other 3 games he has been an unused sub in 2 of them, and got on for 7 mins in the other. Not exactly what you'd expect if he is to make a first team berth his own, is it? Nevertheless, I still hope I see him on the field at least some of the time tomorrow.

I see he has just joined Reading on a 3 month loan. He was a regular goal scorer for Scunthorpe and Doncaster a few years ago, but less so in the past couple of years with Notts Forest and Southampton. I'm actually going to Reading v Birmingham tomorrow, so it will be interesting on two fronts - a) to see if Billy Sharp is as sharp as our Billy, and b) to see if Andrew Shinnie gets on for Brum. He has been a bench warmer of late, so I'm not optimistic that I'll see him. Maybe I'll take my ICT scarf to wave at him.

Hope we avoid Aberdeen in the next round!

Let's hope for another shock or two tomorrow night to make our task even easier!

And 'Tic missed a penalty just before Morton scored. Sweet.

I'll take that. Terry justified in fielding strongest available team by sound of it. Dundee had a lot more possession according to the stats. Anyway, well done all round.

Flames

Even I can't remember that far back!! But I do remember Caley playing Rangers at the Clach part, in a testimonial for Bobby Bolt, round about 51/52. There were well over 10,000 there that day to see an extremely strong Rangers side, including George Young and Willie Woodburn, win 5-3.