PerfICT

If the deal is £600k and 6 months loan back (and no Stokes on loan for the season), as has been reported, this is an absolutely horrendous deal for us: best player gone in 4 months and still no decent striker. I really hate the transfer windows, but the last two have been an absolute disaster for ICT.

I agree, I would prefer he said nothing than stuff like "when the old firm come calling you do not say no". Ryan has a decision to make and comments like this will only encourage him to join Celtic, in the meantime rubbing salt in it for us. Is there any need to publicly tell Ryan that he can't say no to Celtic? Agree - I thought that was a particularly naive comment. I also wasn't very keen to hear JH say that Ryan is a Celtic fan. Honesty is one thing, but there is a real skill to effective communication and these comments in particular were not very pallitable to ICT fans. If this was a genuine club strategy, then it should have been meticulously planned before the end of last season, discussed with the player and then conducted behind closed doors while Hughes went searching for effective replacements for Shinnie, Mckay and Watkins. Now it is all too late and we're not in a position to spend any cash wisely (just panic buys). Hope the Stokes deal comes off in the short term, but please, please, please plan for next season or there will be an exodus in June which will cripple us.

Excellent point, HtG! Now that they've knee-capped the teams that were 3rd and 4th last year, they just need to decimate Aberdeen and Hearts to clear the path for another stroll to the title.

Stokes certainly sweetens this deal - there's no doubt he's a quality striker, although I don't care much for some of his antics off the field. Right now, however, he'll give us exactly what we're missing and the rest of the season will look a lot brighter.......until he gets injured, of course!

From highlights - not much in the game. Good finish from Raven after break of the ball. Poor penalty saved and criminal defending from a pretty shabby cross for the goal. Stupid foul from Mutombo for red card.

Not sure he will, though, DD. I suspect he'll play Roberts if he's now fit. There seems a real reluctance to play Ferguson or Sutherland - neither could be worse than what I've seen of Lopez tbf. A friend who is a Dundee Utd fan was at Ross County today. He had not been keen on the McKay signing but has completely changed his tune. Despite not scoring he felt McKay was their " diamond in the rough" and wished they'd had him earlier. He thinks he'd have made the difference in narrow games where they've dropped points before today (eg Dundee derby). Gutting given he was one of our own, had become available and a position we are very sadly lacking in now. Agree, but the truth is that we would never be able to match United on wages and it seems that wages was a sticking point for the deal to go ahead there.

County are not a bigger club than us - I'd say they are almost exactly the same size, based on gates. They are, however, a richer club simply because of the input of a rich benefactor. MacGregor's financial muscle has saved County in the past two seasons. We can't rely on the same rescue if we find ourselves in trouble come January. Cash is king and its killing football.

A win there would have been a bonus, but it sounds like we threw it away again. Would have taken a draw at the start, but always so disappointing to lose a late goal.

1-1 and Mutombo sent off. Shambles. BBC seem to now suggest it was Carreiro for Dundee sent off instead of Mutombo - what's going on? 1-1 FT.

Rave knows when to score important goals!

.....sounds like he's now going to United on loan in stead now. Unconfirmed as yet.

I've got to say that I've never been so concerned about our football club. Granted, I was dreaming when I thought that the Cup success would improve our gate and attractiveness to players, but I'm really disappointed that we haven't managed to solidify our position (note: not "go to the next level" which is both a horrible expression and a pipe dream) and to make reasonable signings to replace the inevitable departure of our best players. Irreplaceable? Maybe in the short term, but there must be some rough diamonds out there as Watkins and Mckay proves! Instead, we are exactly where we were: a small club on the periphery of the radar with a very small budget that appears to be pretty low down on players' wish list. The Cup victory doesn't appear to have made one iota of difference. JH clearly hasn't been sitting on his hands with respect to transfers but he is quoted to have said that he has been turned down by a number of signing targets. Why? Salary? Lack of training facilities? Location? Whatever the reason, we're now left to scrabble at the bottom of the barrel 3 days before the transfer window closes, with an injury list that could fill the first team! My disillusionment isn't really with the club - they run a very tight ship and rightly so. I think it's just with the realisation that we will eventually find our level, based on the size of the core support (~2500) and our lack of resource, and that this might well not be in the premiership (but could be in an expanded top league, if that were to ever happen). Cash is king - whether borrowed, stolen or earned - and we quite simply can't compete in that market, cup winners and European candidates or not! A miserable post, I know! On a chearier note, I will nevertheless continue to buy my season ticket to support my local team!

Away again!

...and this once again raises the issue of players' value. We sell him to Wigan for ~£150k on tghe back of a couple of seasons in which he scores >20 goals in each and, following a handful of games and no goals (I think) in 6 months at Wigan, his value has apparently gone UP by 1/3rd! While I understand that value is based on many factors, including length of contract remaining etc, I can't help thinking that ICT are seen as a soft touch in the transfer market.

Sadly, I agree. A real shame for Aaron Doran, but I think we've seen the last of him.

I see (3rd hand via Scotsman) that Dundee United have put in a 3rd bid for Billy Mckay..

Looks like he can do it against Prem teams too. A very good call ages ago, ICTRoughi, but I just can't see that we'd attract him here.

Certainly not intended to be negative - actually just trying to point the very reason that we find ourselves where we are. 5 departures + 10 injuries = a whole new team - that's all this was about. There is not a club in the country (including Celtic) that would cope with that kind of upheaval. I didn't really expect this to be a year of transition - the spine of the team is still there - but the injuries have put paid to any chance of stability. I still think Meekings will make a big difference when he returns and I believe Roberts showed promise pre-season (not even seen him feature yet!)

... only an illustration of the contrast between the start of this season and the start of last. The point is that in the space of 12 months we have lost our entire first team for one reason or another. you could just as easily put forward a team of current crocks vs fit players, which tells a slightly different story centred on misfortune.

Assuming the rumours about injuries to Lopez and Tansey are correct, we have now lost a full team's worth of regulars (including subs) since this time last season! The current v absentee teams would line up something like this: Fon Williams Raven Devine Draper Tremarco Horner Polworth Vigurs Williams Christie Mutombo subs:Sutherland, Brown, Ferguson, Wedderburn vs Mckay Watkins Doran Vincent Roberts Ross Tansey Shinnie Warren Meekings Brill subs: Mackay (goalie), Lopez, Foran Who would your money be on???

There's no choice now - the boys may or may not be ready, but we literally have nobody else AT ALL. Grow a pair and get them in!

...I fully agree that what money was spent was wasted in the wrong areas and I wasn't really pointing the finger at the board. However, JH obviously has an axe to grind because he has openly indicated in the press that there was no more cash and he needed a striker. Now it appears that more cash has been made available, but IMO it is too late in the transfer window. In short, I don't know what planning there was (if any), but we are now a team full of very similar midfielders, with little invention, no cover at all at the back and no strikeres. Of course the injury list hasn't helped, but this car-crash was imminent since January and nothing appears to have been put in place to mitigate!

Looking from the outside, and with liitle information to go on, the concerning thing here is the apparent lack of planning, coupled with a perception that there has been a lot of quibbling between manager and chairman over available funds. Mckay was our only recognised striker in January and he left for a fee. This meant that there were at least 2 vacancies for strikers from then and funds should have been made available from the fee in order to get the whole thing moving at that point - there were plenty of punters coming to the end of contracts who were potential targets. I am not in the slightest bit surprised that JH is struggling to find any quality at this stage of the transfer window, now that money appears to have been found. The horse has bolted.

Well, if anybody had any lingering ambitions of us being top 6 this season, our home performances this season have indicated that we're in a relegation dogfight. First 15 min were OK, but we never got a hold of Morris and Crawford and we're are completely at a loss up front. Lopez actually had his best game on Sat, but he's still a long way short of what we need and he missed a sitter at a crucial time. I actually didn't realise that Tansey was playing until he was substituted and Draper had a shocker for the first goal. Christie took a battering and deserved better protection. Only pass marks were for Williams; Tremarco also payed well when he came on and Wedderburn also did OK, but has no pace. The only glimmer of hope is that Meekings comes back in and Draper can resume in the holdong role in midfield. Oh dear.

...I think we should concentrate on actually getting into the penalty area to start winning penalty kicks than worrying about who's going to take them!