Merger Talk

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

Plenty season tickets were handed out free of charge to the worthies in the Caley club to ensure a "yes" vote .

Urban myth!! No they werent. 

 

Oh yes they most certainly were . I know of several Caley club regulars that were gifted one .

[lukemackay]

 

 

Plenty season tickets were handed out free of charge to the worthies in the Caley club to ensure a "yes" vote .

Urban myth!! No they werent. 

 

 

Oh yes they most certainly were . I know of several Caley club regulars that were gifted one .

 

good means i have an spl team to support now.

[reefinweedallday]

 

 

Anyway it happened nearly 20yrs ago don't even know how my memory serves me so well.....

 

 

Now that's a pretty damning admission to be making for someone who has spent much of today making blanket assertions and accusations (albeit totally lacking substance) about events of the very era in question!

As it happens my memory serves me quite well... even better since I happened to listen through to over an hour of broadcast material from the time over the holidays..... and I certainly have no recollection at all of reporting that Peter Donald was accosted by hooligans... notwithstanding the way a number of them frequently behaved! On the other hand if Reefinweed would care to indicated in which publication or in which radio broadcast I allegedly said this, it may help to clarify the matter.

 

Maybe also it's Reef's dodgy memory which prevents him from recollecting that BOTH sides within Caley recruited equally vigorously in that autumn of 1993 to the extent that, although ST holders increased from just over 100 to 576, the whole exercise only changed the voting figures by 0.1% (zero point one per cent) at the 1st December meeting compared with the 9th September one. And even after that exhaustive recruitment, the Rebels could only muster 226 people sufficiently "anti" to vote as such.

 

But really, this thread has spent much of the day floundering among assertions which belong firmly to the same stable as "Hitler is alive and well in Bolivia", "The Loch Ness Monster has been doing somesaults in front of Urquhart Castle", a Lancaster bomber has just landed on the moon" and "Lord Lucan is hiding Shergar on a ranch in Western Australia".

 

Charles you should take up a new occupation...David Camerons new spin doctor perhaps??

 

so you are you saying that the "anti-merger" "phonebox" brigade bought season tickets to vote yes?? I believe the club handed out over 100 free season tickets just in the days prior to the vote not to mention how many were handed out in the weeks leading up to the vote.Would that have been perhaps because the vote was a lot closer than you are suggesting.Roughly in the region of 450 season ticket books handed out to swing the vote.

 

You as the man that his written a book about the subject must know that the players were told in no uncertain terms which way to vote...enough of them making it known how unhappy they were about it at the time.I believe wad was the only one who told them not a chance? or are you disputing this fact as well?

 

As for the article about "accosted by hooligans" i will find out for you if it was a radio piece or a written article.I still to this day can't understand why you said that when it was people handing a petition to the league secretary?

Feelings ran very high at the time i'm sure there was behaviour that wasn't great but i'm sure this piece was written or broadcast on the day of the vote,at the Kingsmills hotel i believe? Perhaps it was in your interest to blacken the "refusenicks name" the "phonebox brigade" "the rebels" or whatever other slanderous name you wish to call them this week? still hurt does it?

[reefinweedallday]

 

Plenty season tickets were handed out free of charge to the worthies in the Caley club to ensure a "yes" vote .

Urban myth!! No they werent. 

 

so everybody paid for them then?

[Yngwie]

so everybody paid for them then?

 

 

See my post #224, I'm pretty sure the revenue was publicly reconciled to the STs in issue, but perhaps someone can confirm or refute my recollection.

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

so everybody paid for them then?

 

 

See my post #224, I'm pretty sure the revenue was publicly reconciled to the STs in issue, but perhaps someone can confirm or refute my recollection.

 

Certain people bought season tickets and distributed them to their cronies in the Caley club to ensure a yes vote .

[reefinweedallday]

 

Sorry Buckett, I just can't buy into the notion that Caley would have done just as well on their own. Their fan base would have been so much smaller, Caley actually weren't that popular and indeed were even actively disliked  in Inverness outwith their own orbit, they would not have had the universal appeal that ICT had, would they have got in on their own in the first place?, and if they did they would only have had a fraction of the resources that ICT had. For instance, of the £4.8M stadium budget, at least £1.8M would not have been available to Caley since there was a lot of public funding they wouldn't have got and they wouldn't have had Thistle's asset contribution either.

 

 

A very linear and simplistic viewpoint, Charles, which I'm afraid just doesn't hold water. 

 

As you're probably aware, many years before the merger Caley had been trying to relocate with a view to Scottish League entry. I think there was a site in Carse which had been considered although the District Council had been very obstructive to this proposal. Had it gone ahead we would have had a Scottish League team in Inverness with a stadium within easy walking distance of thousands of houses and with room for expansion to accommodate the growing support. No need for £4.8M stadium budgets and no need for another team's assets. And with such an accessible stadium, attendances would probably exceed those of ICT now.

 

I mention this because there are so many ifs and buts that you can't just make a statement like "it couldn't have happened without the merger". Of course it could!

 

Also, I have to take exception to your statement that "Caley weren't that popular . . . actively disliked in Inverness." This is simply not true!

 

That's a belter from Mr Bannerman,Caley were actively disliked in Inverness? I was a Thistle fan but even i know this is lies Caley had a bigger fanbase than Thistle with Clach probably having the biggest support of the lot before they went in to terminal decline.

[reefinweedallday]

 

 

so everybody paid for them then?

 

 

See my post #224, I'm pretty sure the revenue was publicly reconciled to the STs in issue, but perhaps someone can confirm or refute my recollection.

 

 

Certain people bought season tickets and distributed them to their cronies in the Caley club to ensure a yes vote .

 

100% correct.A lot of season tickets handed out "free" to people who didn't even follow football....as long as they could say YES it was ok.Although Mr Bannerman will re-write history and pretend none of this happened.

[Yngwie]

So some people bought season tickets as gifts for their friends? Not a crime, and a pretty smart move I suppose, but I can see why some wouldn't like it. Why didn't the rebels think of it? In those days how did the cost of a season ticket compare to hiring a double decker bus?

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

I posed the question on here a while ago if the CTO posters would be happy if ICT were to merge with Ross County and be renamed Highland F.C. and the overwhelming response was that they wouldn't mind !!! Says it all for me .

[reefinweedallday]

So some people bought season tickets as gifts for their friends? Not a crime, and a pretty smart move I suppose, but I can see why some wouldn't like it. Why didn't the rebels think of it? In those days how did the cost of a season ticket compare to hiring a double decker bus?

They had an awful lot of friends they didn't know that well....     It was a very smart move and plenty were outraged about it.

I could be wrong but i think the rebels were banned from telford street at the time and therefore not allowed to buy season ticket books.I will stand corrected on this if it is wrong as i said my memory is fading.

 

There are others out there a lot more qualified than me to discuss the subject,i'm just trying to point out it wasn't all a bed of roses and the facts remain a lot of underhand strokes were pulled.I think the same aims could have been achieved and everybody united if they just took a couple of simple points on board instead of rail roading everybody to do it as HIE ETC WANTED

[reefinweedallday]

I posed the question on here a while ago if the CTO posters would be happy if ICT were to merge with Ross County and be renamed Highland F.C. and the overwhelming response was that they wouldn't mind !!! Says it all for me .

Seriously?? must have passed me by that post.

 

That is quite frankly shocking.derby rivals,closest team to you etc and the majority wouldn't mind merging??....Modern Football and it's fans i really do despair

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

I posed the question on here a while ago if the CTO posters would be happy if ICT were to merge with Ross County and be renamed Highland F.C. and the overwhelming response was that they wouldn't mind !!! Says it all for me .

Seriously?? must have passed me by that post.

 

That is quite frankly shocking.derby rivals,closest team to you etc and the majority wouldn't mind merging??....Modern Football and it's fans i really do despair

 

Justified with guff like " if it was for the best for football in the Highlands then I'd be all for it "

[IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER]

Lets go the whole hog and bring Hellgin on board as well.

[reefinweedallday]

Lets go the whole hog and bring Hellgin on board as well.

Oh ffs your really tripping now!!

 

My hate for those furry boots C*&ts will never Stop!!!

Just wish they would hurry up and get promoted before i'm too old.....

[IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER]

But it does make financial sense and would ensure Highland representation in the upper echelons of the new Scottish set up. I would be only too willing to bury the hatchet with old County and Hellgin foes.

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

Lets go the whole hog and bring Hellgin on board as well.

Oh ffs your really tripping now!!

 

My hate for those furry boots C*&ts will never Stop!!!

Just wish they would hurry up and get promoted before i'm too old.....

 

Elgin strolled through Inverness unnopposed when ICT played them in the cup recently mate , they had a good mob with them but nothing that couldn't have been dealt with by ICI in the day ;-)

[IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER]

But imagine a resurrection of a Staigo, Ferry, Animals and Strath combination. That would get any feckin side thrown out quickly.

[CaleyD]

Yeah, ICI could have furnished them with a calling card and everything....real hard nuts 

[lukemackay]

dalneighcaley, youve brought this thread right down with your bitterness. almost 20 years on, get over it.

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

Yeah, ICI could have furnished them with a calling card and everything....real hard nuts 

What would you know about ICI , this was way before you started going to the football .

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

dalneighcaley, youve brought this thread right down with your bitterness. almost 20 years on, get over it.

It's a thread about the merger boy . You probably weren't even born when we were scrapping with other likeminded lads all over the Highlands .

[CaleyD]

 

Yeah, ICI could have furnished them with a calling card and everything....real hard nuts 

What would you know about ICI , this was way before you started going to the football .

 

 

Apparently so....!!!

[Renegade]

 

Not being pedantic renegade merely pointing out that it was not unique to scottish football as you stated

 

 

My original post was in answer to somebody agreeing with somebody else that the club should make the red and blue stripes a permanent fixture.  This followed on from the discussion about what the club's image should be.  For many clubs, the home shirts and their design is an important part.  It was pretty obvious that I was talking about the home kit and it, as Scottish club's kits go, is unique is the sense that no other Scottish league club has it as their home shirt (while others may have as an away kit or have had it in the past they are not uniquely identified by it).

 

I think some people just like arguing about nothing! 

[DALNEIGHCALEY]

Yeah, ICI could have furnished them with a calling card and everything....real hard nuts 

What would you know about ICI , this was way before you started going to the football .

 

 

Apparently so....!!!

 

I dont know anyone that remembers you from the Highland League days . Who did you go to the games with ?