hislopsoffsideagain

Like our lineup, especially if Bayne is injured. We have a midfield there that will run their socks off all evening long. Can we last more than 10 minutes before conceding this time?

Awwwwwwwwww, we're going to get hammered... Just thought I would inject some positive thinking.

Yeah, straight red tackle, but I don't think he should be banned for any more than the three matches. In Eduardo's case, his prognosis may well be worse because, unlike Larsson's injury, in this case it is a compund fracture (i.e. the bone can be seen sticking out of the skin). The pictures I've seen are also suggestive of dislocation at the ankle joint. It's about a year since I've done any orthopaedics, but I suspect that the surgeons will put in about enough metal to build a new Forth Road Bridge! It's incredibly sad that this is happened, but the advances made in treating serious sports injuries have been phenomenal in recent years so I'm hopeful that there will be grounds for optimism.

Come on Brew, you have substitutes for a reason. two-nil, three-nil, four-nil are all worth exactly the same in terms of points, might as well go for broke. (Yes, I know, goal difference and all that).

Why the fudge isn't Wyness on the pitch yet?

Calm down, chaps, if being comfortably safe from relegation in February is "a crisis", then I'm up for a crisis every season. So we're going through a rough patch. It's football. Form comes and goes. Mind you, it doesn't make me feel much better about being 2 down in the first 10 mins away from home twice in four days...

Like the idea of playing Imrie and Cowie in the wide midfield areas. As stated elsewhere, I don't expect Bayne to make much of an impact up front today against Rob Jones.

I'm talking specifically about this match. There are matches where Bayne is useful to have (mostly as a substitute, mind) but if he starts today I think he's likely to be about as effective as an inflatable dartboard.

For the love of god, not Bayne up front. I was at Easter Road when we lost there last season and I don't think Bayne won a header in the whole match, while in the process giving away dozens of fouls. Bayne is our biggest forward, but he's still not good enough to trouble Jones. Wyness and Niculae up top, and for crying out loud, can we try and keep it on the deck? One of the trends of the season appears to be punting the ball up towards the opposition's big centre-backs, balls we can never win. In a dream world I'd try to somehow fit Markus, Imrie and Cowie into the same team, but this is probably the sort of game which calls for Duncan, Black and McBain in 3 of the midfield roles. I have a sneaky feeling that if we give our best performance of the season and win 4-0, some posters will still be claiming on Monday that there is a crisis (even if Niculae scores a hat-trick)

You mean my posts don't provide enough quality? (sobs into keyboard)

Yeah, Imrie was our best player I think, though McGuire and Munro were also ecellent (apart from the goal we let in, I suppose). 4-5-1 just wasn't the right shape at all today. Niculae needed semaphore flags to communicate with the midfield, he was so isolated. Black was ineffectual while Duncan's passing was, well, frustrating at best, and downright incompetent at worst. We somehow managed to lose the midfield battle despite seeming to have an extra player. Poor show. I feel vindicated because I was screaming for Markus to come on. A Paat on the back for him! (I'll just get me coat). But I would suggest that, chasing an equalizer with 10 minutes left, we might be better playing more than one striker? There was also a naughty rumour that Wyness's absence is because he has signed a pre-contract with Hibs, but I don't know what to make of that... All in all, a draw was probably fair, but the first two-thirds of the game was completely and utterly hopeless.

I know the opinion on Ritchie Hart has been polarised (rightly or wrongly) by the incident last summer. From a footballing point of view, however, he has been a good servant to the club - I don't think anyone can argue too much with that. He was another of Pele's clever little signings, a guy with a fantastic engine and, on his day, a great range of passing. Part of the fun with him was that you never knew whether you would get the good Hart (crunching tackles, bundles of energy, great delivery and a threat from long range) or the bad Hart (hands on hips, gash crosses and caught on the ball). In the end, one can only speculate about whether he might have moved onto the next level if he hadn't been stifled by constant visits to the treatment table. We haven't seen enough from him in the last couple of years to justify a new contract for him, I suppose. So in conclusion, thanks Ritchie for your contribution to ICT's rise over the last few years, and best of luck over the bridge, where you should be able to kick some first division *** next season.

Why not use it in the same capacity as Hibs fans use Sunshine On Leith? It's cheesy as **** but you could get people singing it and get a bit of atmosphere going pre-kickoff. I think what we really need is some proper music when the teams come out. I was at the Riverside stadium to see Boro v Liverpool a few weeks ago and as the teams come out the song they use is the one that we turn into "doo-doo-doo-doo, Dennis Wyness" - I have no idea what its actually called! But it gets everything clapping and singing and it's fantastic for atmosphere. Admittedly there were 33,000 at the boro game, but still... Or we could use the dambusters theme?!

...Ian Black! Blackie was the winner of the man of the match poll against Aberdeen, Hibs and Rangers, and took second place against Gretna, so it's no surprise he also garnered the most votes. Of course, the postponement of the Motherwell game means that all POTY polls for January are now closed. The results in each match were: vs Aberdeen: Ian Black 5pts, Michael Fraser 3pts, Don Cowie 1pt vs Gretna: Marius Niculae 5pts, Ian Black 3pts, Michael Fraser 1pt vs Hibernian: Ian Black 5pts, Michael Fraser 3pts, Marius Niculae 1pt vs Rangers: Ian Black 5pts, Michael Fraser 3pts, Don Cowie 1pt In terms of votes, Blackie got 91 out of 128 cast over the month, with Ike Fraser getting 68 and Marius Niculae third with 65. As for the player of the year standings, it gets tighter at the top... 1) Don Cowie 55pts 2) Michael Fraser 54 pts 3) Ian Black 46pts 4) Marius Niculae 39pts 5) Ross Tokely 14pts It's pretty safe to say it's a four horse race now! For the record, the previous player of the month winners were: August: Michael Fraser September: Don Cowie October: Don Cowie November: Don Cowie December: Michael Fraser Who needs Nintendo DS Brain Training when you've got these numbers, a piece of paper and a stubby, blunt pencil, eh?

From what I remember of Rangers' Champions' League encounters with Juventus, Cleland never got close to Del Piero... :tic01: From what I know, he's supposedly a pretty decent youth coach, so good stuff.

Just back. I suspect I might be in the minority here, but I thought we were really great today. A lot of people will moan about our poor use of the ball in the final third, and perhaps a lack of adventure on our parts, but that Rangers defence is as good as any we'll play this year. So often we had the ball in midfield with Black, and he had no options because the marking was tighter than pair of Paris Hilton hotpants. Our defence, until the last twenty minutes, was excellent as well - Proctor was my MOTM and Munro had his best performance of the season. As said above, Rangers maybe just shaded it, but we would have been good value for a point.

I have exactly the same except for Wyness on 12pts - I thought I was to give him 1pt for the Motherwell game where Marius came first and Michael and Don tied for second. I have all the numbers made up for each separate game, each month and overall standings including total votes, which all seem to add up perfectly. It's in a microsoft word format if you want me to send it to you? I couldn't be bothered horsing around with a spreadsheet so dared to use a combination of my brain and a calculator (mostly the calculator!)

No probs, Scotty, will do it ASAP - just a couple of questions... 1) Where are the poll results for the games in August? They don't appear to be on the drop down menu. 2) What are the tiebreakers when players have the same number of points from a single match? It's no surprise that Don Cowie was player of the month in both September and October...

Cheers, Scotty. If you want, I'd be happy to do the sums, I'm a bit autistic that way! I see all the poll results are still available on the website except for games before September 1st.

Who's winning so far this year? Can't find updated scores, or player of the month awards. Of course, it may be because I'm blinder than a bat whose eardrums have been gouged out...

I need to go on wikipedia and find out who Statler and Waldorf are... That's about as easy as it gets in the SPL, I suppose (except when we did them at Fir Park). Niculae's first goal was a cracker, not least because of Duncan's magnificent run to set it up. I thought Duncan was fantastic today, and he brought a great save out of Caig in the second half. As said before, the second half was a bit of a kickabout - I think that we could have stepped up a gear and scored more if we'd needed to, but they've played a lot of games over the festive period so I think they were entitled to take the foot off the gas a bit. And a well done to Rossco, who, after being slagged a lot following Pittodrie (not least by me) had a very good game today.

I think things have come to a head today because of Rossco's error, but for me this is just the latest of many mistakes/poor performances that he's racked up in the last season and a bit. Apart from today, I made it to Tannadice and our home win over Hibs, and I thought that in both games Proctor got forward as often has Rossco does, passed as well as Rossco does, but noticeably Proc gets back a gazillion times quicker than Tokes does when attacks break down. I'm not convinced that Proc is more naturally talented, but I think all Tokely's problems are based on the fact that after about 20 minutes he's knackered... As an aside, while Sophia makes very good points in her post, does anyone else picture her as a prim 19th century schoolmistress with spectacles on the end of her nose and her hair tied back in a bun? Or is it just me?

Agreed. Back to topic. I thought "roscoe23" was a reference to the number of pounds Tokely has put on since he won those awards...

Whythankyouverymuch, RiG! I don't think we've agreed on anything since primary school, when we both supported the San Francisco 49ers...

I stand by my comments on the matchday thread. He is unfit and looks overweight, and has done since the beginning of last season. Scotty is right, as always. He deserved those awards a few years ago. But I've long lost patience with Tokely, and Proctor has now shown that he is at least as good an option. Rossco, in short, needs to shape up or ship out.