ICT & That SPL Vote

[BornCaley]

A Jambo at work was having a go at a Hibee fan today and the conversation turned to the SPL vote fiasco that ICT went through to get into the SPL all those years ago. He go the impression that Hibs voted against our entry to the league. I was asked about who voted what and i couldnt remember who voted ICT in and who voted against.

Does anyone know what the for & against result was.

On a related side note, i remember some news footage outside Hampden when the second vote was announced and i remember a few ICt fans were at Hampden and shook hands with the Partick board as they left the stadium. Are these members of CTO.com? Ive always been curiuos as to who they were.

[Scotty]

A Jambo at work was having a go at a Hibee fan today and the conversation turned to the SPL vote fiasco that ICT went through to get into the SPL all those years ago. He go the impression that Hibs voted against our entry to the league. I was asked about who voted what and i couldnt remember who voted ICT in and who voted against.

Does anyone know what the for & against result was.

On a related side note, i remember some news footage outside Hampden when the second vote was announced and i remember a few ICt fans were at Hampden and shook hands with the Partick board as they left the stadium. Are these members of CTO.com? Ive always been curiuos as to who they were.

There were 2 votes .... The first one we lost 7-5 as our groundshare was rejected: According to the official site, http://www.ictfc.co.uk/articles/20060905/s..._2208845_893004 there were 3 'no' votes and 2 abstentions.

Aberdeen, Hearts and both of the OF are said in various articles to have voted for us, and you would assume that Partick voted against. It was further suggested that both Dundee and Livingston also voted against ICT as keeping Partick in the SPL meant that all teams shared the parachute payments and both clubs were close to penniless. http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/da...s/ai_n37238078/ so the third abstention came from one of Hibs, Motherwell, Kilmarnock or Dunfermline ..... so at worst they abstained.

or maybe not .... according to this article DUFC & Partick abstained and Dundee, Rangers and one other voted against .... http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/spl/ab...ivision-1.84022

Ok - definitely Dundee voting against, DUFC abstaining, and Aberdeen supporting as the various chairmen had confirmed that: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/s...rem/3771665.stm & http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/s...rem/3774831.stm

anyhoo, regardless of that, ICT then appealed the decision and the second meeting was called at the behest of both Hearts and Hibs (who both said they had had inadequate advice from the SPL to make a decision) with Thomson from DUFC saying publicly that he would not only support the bid but also make a case that we should be allowed to play at the TCS from day 1. That would suggest that Hibs maybe voted for us initially, otherwise why would they call for the second meeting ?

Partick then went to the court of session to try and get the meeting cancelled but were denied and when the meeting took place we won the second vote 10-2 but Thomson's additional proposal wasnt approved (as we know). Partick would have voted against us again and I get the feeling that Livi may have been the other .....

The whole crux of the argument from Partick was not that we didnt meet the June 1st deadline for applying to the SPL (we submitted our application on May 28th) but that the 31st March deadline for stadium criteria was not met. However, at the time Eddie Thomson revealed that SPL lawyer Rod McKenzie had indicated to them that the March deadline did not apply to the groundshare proposal as it does not apply to groundsharing where the ground to be shared is already compliant with the SPL stadium criteria. that was what eventually sunk Partick even though they then appealed the decision and the whole thing rumbled on into July ...... although they did offer to go quietly .......... for a million quid !!! http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_8002...5/ai_n37239454/

UEFA: http://en.uefa.com/memberassociations/news...sid=198734.html

[Scotty]

in other words ....... its all as clear as mud !!!!

[BornCaley]

many thanks for the Info Scotty and yes its still as clear as mud.

I think even now the mindset of certain clubs hasn't changed. I shudder to think where would we be if the 2nd vote was ruled out or we lost the vote. I didnt realise that it was the 2 Edinburgh clubs who asked for the recount.

[Scotty]

I would agree .....

In my mind, and I have said it before, relegation/promotion should be automatic and the club coming up should be given the whole of their first season in the SPL to make their ground compliant if it isnt already ... that way they can use the extra money made to develop their ground (as well as trying to compete). I would also get rid of the undersoil heating rule and go with "adequate pitch protection" which might be USH or a blanket or even what they use over here .. a heated dome that goes up in winter and comes down in summer.

We have seen it all the time in D1 - the race is usually tight and clubs have an unrealistic deadline of March to spend loads of cash making themselves compliant when there is no guarantee they will actually win the league and recoup any of that outlay. (I believe its in the dictionary under the heading Dundee )

[Charles Bannerman]

It's six years ago now and I had forgotten the minutiae of the votes and meetings. But one thing I have not forgotten is the sheer statesmanship with which Ken Mackie led Caley Thistle through that difficult summer of 2004.

[The Fly]

Agreed 100% on Ken Mackie's conduct throughout - I think that could well have been the thing that clinched it for us, apart from the obvious merits of our case. A different chairman taking a different attitude could have resulted in a different outcome.

ISTR that Interthenet was there at Hampden, and possibly Iain Coia as well? I know one of them let out a yelp when the verdict was annouced by David Taylor (or was it someone else?) and he looked a bit startled momentarily

[BornCaley]

Agreed 100% on Ken Mackie's conduct throughout - I think that could well have been the thing that clinched it for us, apart from the obvious merits of our case. A different chairman taking a different attitude could have resulted in a different outcome.

ISTR that Interthenet was there at Hampden, and possibly Iain Coia as well? I know one of them let out a yelp when the verdict was annouced by David Taylor (or was it someone else?) and he looked a bit startled momentarily :D

Thanks Fly. I did feel a tad sorry for Partick, especially after they came to the Clyde game to support us during the run up to the end of season. I Imagine they never expected ICT to go up, so the footage of our supporters shaking hands with the Partick board was a nice gesture as i imagine they must have been devastated.

Edited July 8, 2010 by BornCaley

[Heilandee]

As Scotty points out the waters are pretty muddy especially after several years and they were no less muddy at the time. Dundee did indeed vote against ICT being allowed to groundshare with Aberdeen and i personally was pretty vocal in my condemnation of our boards decision at the time.Jimmy and Peter Marr, in fairness, took the time to come to a meeting in Inverness and explained they had documentary evidence from the SFA that 31st March was the date for goundshares and they had been forced to comply to similar when the same applied to us,i got the feeling the veto was more to do with preventing Aberdeen gaining financial advantage than preventing ICT's advancement and definately nothing to do with hoping to split any parachute payment!! Indeed,at the time there were also 2 other proposals on the table from ICT which would have allowed ICT to play at home from the start of season which the Marrs voted in favour of, but 7 clubs voted against!!

I'm no great lover of the Marrs,but they got flak for this and put their hands up and explained their reasoning,bear in mind it was a secret vote and they had no obligation to say which way they voted but did, while others attempted to spin things in their favour once public opinion became apparent.

[Scotty]

all in all it was a complete cluster**** and as noted, the ballot was "private" so there is no way to know 100% what anyone did - or why they voted a certain way - other than taking the word of various chairmen or representatives or believing various conspiracy theories in the media .....

You could also argue about who was allowed to vote ? should Partick have been allowed to vote on a motion deciding their own fate - clearly a conflict of interest. If - as suggested by one report - they abstained then fair play to them but in the SPL an abstention is almost equivalent to a no vote so perhaps not exactly philanthropic! Should Aberdeen have been allowed to vote as they were clearly going to benefit the most financially from any groundshare? Again a potential conflict of interest? with almost every other vote, teams may have had other "political" issues to consider - a share of the parachute payment if no-one went down, not wanting to have the expense of travelling to Inverness twice a season, fearing the size of travelling support ICT would bring to games in the central belt, etc etc etc - all in all not very democratic and certainly not focused on developing and improving the game or the teams who make the effort to try and get to and then win D1 !

As I posted above, I would definitely favour a rigid system of promotion/relegation. None of this 'no relegation' on a technicality. If you finish last you go down end of story. If you finish top of the division above then you go up end of story. Have reccomended minimum requirements in terms of facilities for each league and if a team going up does not already meet those requirements give them a full season in the league above (with the extra revenue) to meet those requirements. If they cannot or do not meet that requirement by the end of that season then they are automatically relegated along with the team finishing last so we dont have any further instances of teams staying up on a technicality.

[Heilandee]

I would definitely favour a rigid system of promotion/relegation. None of this 'no relegation' on a technicality. If you finish last you go down end of story. If you finish top of the division above then you go up end of story. Have reccomended minimum requirements in terms of facilities for each league and if a team going up does not already meet those requirements give them a full season in the league above (with the extra revenue) to meet those requirements. If they cannot or do not meet that requirement by the end of that season then they are automatically relegated along with the team finishing last so we dont have any further instances of teams staying up on a technicality.

Reckon all supporters would agree wi that Scotty,but some of the decision makers in charge of the various governing bodies are beyond comprehension and cleary influenced by factors other than the "good of the game"