Dundee Utd -V- ICT : Matchday Thread

[Caley Mad In Berks]

I watched it late last night on Alba. How sad is that? In the old days we would have said it was a typical mid table end of season game. Nothing to play for. But with top 6 still up for grabs there was a strange lack of urgency about us. Dundee Utd were there for the taking, clearly below par after 5 games in 10 days. But we seemingly could not motivate ourselves to give it a real go.

Had this form over last 3 months happened at the beginning of the season I have no doubt that Butcher would have been long gone by now. Our early season good run bought him time, but he badly needs to motivate the team for an end of seson push.

Somehow ending up 9th or 10th will seem like a poor season, even though, realistically most of us would have settled for that at day one.

Come on lads, give us just a little more to be proud of in the last few games.

[12th Man]

Any way of watching BBC Alapa- SPL football, if you dont have sky or freesat.

Any info in the dates for moving BBC Alba to freeview?

[12th Man]

Our spring of discontent is mainly due to being too good for too long whilst others teams have been below par, if our success was spread out a bit more through the season, would we be far happier.

If the wins were spread out which saw us creep into a position where we would be in contention for a top six with only 3 games to go I would be happy with that.

[Joonya]

I can only echo what most have already said. Despite a good handful of wrong decisions from the officials, (Goalkick to united when it was a clear corner, tokely's booking for a 100% clean tackle, amongst other things) we cannot put full blame onto them.

We were dire, plain and simple.

Odi was poor from the start. Frightening how someone with such a poor first touch stayed on the pitch so long. Should have been hooked at half time for sutherland IMO.

Rooney was quiet, but he did seem to lack support up top too.

Foran worked hard but always seems to defer any blame to other people. I recall in the first half a punt up forward from him when it was miles away from anyone. Ultimately he had a go a rooney who was over on the opposite flank. Crazy!

Gillet was excellent when he came on, and I look forward to seeing alot more of him.

For me the biggest question mark - and it gets repeated time and time again - is why we continue to go for the long ball punt and not play it to feet? F-knows how many times this happened, mostly in the second half.

Doing that basically took hayes out the game, who had made a few decent runs in the first half. It also didnt help Doran when he came on either, and also MacDonald, who struggled to leap highest against their full-backs.

United weren't much better, and my Tangerine orange friend who travelled with me yesterday totally agreed.

0-0 would have probably been the fairest outcome IMHO.

[rinomac]

A draw would probably have been a fair result. Both teams weren't exactly great, not many clear cut chances, pretty poor game.

Odhiambo had the touch of an elephant, Rooney was isolated on his own a lot of the time and was left to run after long balls. If he did somehow manage to get to them, there was nobody in sight to help him. Bizarre decision to take him off - I would have gone with two up front as we were one goal down so where was the harm in going for it? Some baffling decisions by the referee but that doesn't meant we would have won if he had made the correct decisions.

Gillet looked good when he came on. Since both he and Shinnie have been out, we have really been lacking a left back. Munro hasn't been bad in that position, he just doesn't offer us as much going forward as these two do.

I really think that we should be playing with two up front. We played much better in the games where we moved Foran up top with Rooney. We are chasing a place in the Top 6, we need to go out and try to win games. Since this is not happening with our current tactics, and has not been happening for quite some time, it's time to try something else.

[+DoofersDad]

Couldn't agree more, particularly with Jonny back. It is clear that teams are scared of Jonny and whenever he has the ball there are 2 or often 3 defenders on him. That means there should be one or two of our team who are being given space. Putting someone up front with Rooney will mean there is either space to exploit or Jonny gets more freedom to terrorise defences.

[Scarlet Pimple]

Does anyone think Terry could be pushing the players too hard. That sounds odd doesn't it?

But, the expectations have been high all through the season and he certainly knows how to rave and outwardly express both his negative and positive emotions volubly.

Maybe inspirational and rousing speeches could now motivate the players better than admitted half-time rants. I am not suggesting a lack of firmness, which undoubtedly some players need to get them going, but is it possible that some of the criticism is personal in any way?

The counter to these thoughts is the roasting that Hearts Manager gave his players yesterday at half time which was indtrumental in rousing the players to get the win and keep running at Saints until the end of the game.

Go figure. It's puzzling .

Comments ?

[Scarlet Pimple]

Oh, and I completely agree that Terry must now adopt a more attacking formation and action. But I have been saying that for ages and it never seems to happen.

If he did, at least he has a chance of getting into the top six but pure defense, or close to it, will bore the fans to death and probably not get a win. The fans surely come for entertainment and deserve this and more.

Vancouver Whitecaps started their journey back into Major League Soccer in North America yesterday by winning their first game, in Vancouver, 4-2 against Toronto. But they won big. And wide and handsome.

Having scoured the world for talented players they seem to have produced a very good, aggressive and determined team.

Sure ; this was a huge opening game for them with a lot at stake,the pitch looked great, the sun was high in the heavens , the backdrop of sun-drenched and snow-covered North Shore mountains looked spectacular, the 22,000 crowd was in roaring form and enjoying every minute of it, but the players were keyed up and nervous energy oozed out of them.

So, it was hell for leather right from the opening whistle and it turned out to be a cracking game where no fan was bored at any time. And the pace was just frenetic,the tackles sometimes crushing and excitement boiled over more than once.

I have to say it --the ref was also great without being over dramatic and allowed the play to flow rather than blowing for every tin-pot infraction..Very impressive performance.

In short, festive, dynamic football at it's best with a standard of pace, ball control and skill that frankly surprised me. And the goals were cracking too with some great moves spiced up with some terrible howlers in defence. The bottom line was that the players put a great deal of energy and fizz into the play and the big crowd had a ball, creating a terrific atmosphere by cheering and cheeringn the players.

So, maybe ICT is a team that is just tired and jaded and all these winter worries, delayed games etc is simpoly too much for the SPL> Time for Summer football folks--long ovredue.

from Western Canada.

[JoRo]

Nick Ross has looked jaded to me in the last few games and needs a rest. He is still a prospect, but I'm burgered if I can work out why he is near the top of the Player of the Year list. His time will come, but for me, Shane is the one more likely to produce the unexpected and get a goal, especially now that his confidence is soaring.

Ross was missing on Saturday as he is ill and will miss going with the Scotland under-21s as well. Jaded? Give the lad a break, he worked his a... off against Celtic on Wednesday with little help from a back four firing aimless ball over the midfield's head all night

[tm4tj]

I agree that he worked hard against Celtic, but he was also just short of the pace required, maybe his illness had someting to do with it.

[tm4tj]

In contrast to our grim game against United, I have just taken a look at the Hearts St Mirren game on the BBC webby, looked to be an entertaining game going by the highlights and good to see St Mirren having a go, they were very unfortunate not to score about five goals.

We need to up our energy levels as a team and get back to a little bit of gung hoism.

[sheepslagger]

Just got to a computer now after going to that game on Saturday. Living down in Dundee and having to meet Arabs on Sunday morning was not the best experience.

What has happened to the silky footie they had to endure when we were last down ? Heedless chickens. Duff well named...He was shocking! Eric ...similar. Why was he kept on for so long ?

Grant Munro does not look comfortable at left back. Thought Rossco had a reasonably good game and why was he booked??. We had a perfect view of it and it was clean as the preverbial.

We were lacklustre in just about everything we did especially going forward. Hoofing it up the park at any opportunity. Didnt start playing until 20 minutes from the end.

Only good thing was that Johnny Hayes seemd to be fired up and starting to get back to his old ways. Hope it continues, but the rest looked like they need a shake from the management.

Let us pray for better things to come.

[+Wanderer]

We need to up our energy levels as a team and get back to a little bit of gung hoism.

I get the feeling that once the away record was achieved, coupled with the relative safety from any likelihood of being embroiled in a relegation battle, the players thought "promoted club, job done" and switched off.

Hayes injury, and others, certainly didn't help and if there is reportedly some unease in the camp then I can well imagine a few minds have wandered forward to the close season.

Last season we didn't wake up until New Year, this time it's the complete opposite.

Puzzling.

[CaleyD]

I don't think you are too far off the mark in regards to your opinion that the season might be seen as "job done".

I also wonder if, despite a few new faces, the squad have fully recovered from the physical and mental efforts of last season (and even the end of the season before).....especially with the added pressure of us operating with a depleted squad for much of this campaign. That's no slight on the players, some of whom have been operating on full throttle for the best part of 15 months (or more).

As fans I think our expectations were heightened by the fact we've spent most of the season in the top 6 (only dropping out of it a couple of weeks ago) and the players will have felt under pressure to maintain that...even though some will, with a certain amount of justification, argue that it's not been reflected in the performances of late...or indeed at home.

What's the answer? No idea....not even sure there is one other than riding the wave and playing through it.

Perhaps "Job Done" is the right way to view the current campaign and it's time to turn attentions towards next season by giving some of the fringe players more opportunity and experimenting a little. Let the players decide if they are hungry enough to fight for that top 6 slot.....if nothing else it will show Butcher which players are committed and who might need to be moved on.

[AndrewLloyd]

Honestly, we had a poor game. Notwithstanding that, along with many others, I thought that the referee was even worse than us. Things became so bad that protests of "homer" were frequently heard from the Caley stand in the second half. I was irate enough to do a quick google of "George Salmond referee". To my astonishment, the first line of Wikipedia reads "George Salmond born 1 December 1969 in Dundee" (source: http://en.wikipedia..../George_Salmond). It's a fact; the referee was at "home"! This is totally daft; why would the SFA put a professional referee in the position of officiating in his home town where his neutrality can so easily be brought into question?

[TheKnowledge]

I see what your saying but, we would then find ourselves on the slippery sloap that ends with referees not being allowed to officiate in their own region, or in cities that their home city have a rivalry with, or in a game involving a player form their home town. The referees are supposed to be impartial, probably are, and it would be showing an awful lot of contempt towards the integrity of our refs, which would mean Neil Lennon was right, which he wasn't.

[Alex MacLeod]

I see what your saying but, we would then find ourselves on the slippery sloap that ends with referees not being allowed to officiate in their own region, or in cities that their home city have a rivalry with, or in a game involving a player form their home town. The referees are supposed to be impartial, probably are, and it would be showing an awful lot of contempt towards the integrity of our refs, which would mean Neil Lennon was right, which he wasn't.

You mean like its done in England? My understanding is that English refs must declare their allegiance and do not officiate at matches involving their own team. Nor do they officiate within 50 miles of their home town.

[PaderbornCaley]

Been uber busy at work this week so just logged on for first time today. Dire game. Bad from both teams tbh. Eric could not do a thing right. Really bad. As for the ref, i don't think he was particularly bad. The problem with locations are that Scotland is a small country, and always struggle to recruit referees. I think it would be difficult to have any boundaries. For example, would a referee from the 'central belt' be biased against ICT? Where do we draw the line with it? Most refs, due to population are central belt based and trying to co-ordinate who goes where would be difficult enough without worrying about what town they live in or how far they live from a town.

[TheKnowledge]

I see what your saying but, we would then find ourselves on the slippery sloap that ends with referees not being allowed to officiate in their own region, or in cities that their home city have a rivalry with, or in a game involving a player form their home town. The referees are supposed to be impartial, probably are, and it would be showing an awful lot of contempt towards the integrity of our refs, which would mean Neil Lennon was right, which he wasn't.

You mean like its done in England? My understanding is that English refs must declare their allegiance and do not officiate at matches involving their own team. Nor do they officiate within 50 miles of their home town.

I didn't realise that was the case. As Capital Caley says though, that would be quite difficult to do in Scotland. Also, if refs can't be trusted to officiate fairly under certain circumstances, they can't be trusted at all.....