ICT move their training base to Kelty

[PatHead]

Incredible. They claim this is to attract players as they won't move to Inverness.

Ross County seem to manage. It will rip the heart out of the club. Why bother supporting your local club if they are not local any more. What about developing local talent. Disgraceful decision.

Imagine if we moved our training base to Bournemouth!

[Mcbizz1998]

Incredible. They claim this is to attract players as they won't move to Inverness.

Ross County seem to manage. It will rip the heart out of the club. Why bother supporting your local club if they are not local any more. What about developing local talent. Disgraceful decision.

Imagine if we moved our training base to Bournemouth!

Get what you mean but I wouldn't care if we trained on the moon if it meant success on the park.

[Onceinawhile]

Incredible. They claim this is to attract players as they won't move to Inverness.

Ross County seem to manage. It will rip the heart out of the club. Why bother supporting your local club if they are not local any more. What about developing local talent. Disgraceful decision.

Imagine if we moved our training base to Bournemouth!

I would imagine this is a precursor to going part time. Part time players probably wont travel to Inverness. They probably will to Kelty though.

[Unseen work]

Embarrassing.

[He's here!]

I would imagine this is a precursor to going part time. Part time players probably wont travel to Inverness. They probably will to Kelty though.

Still leaves them with a lengthy and awkward journey to Inverness for 'home' games. Will the club put them up in hotels the night before?!

Changed days from when Jim McLean insisted all United players must live in Dundee.

Personally I don't get the reluctance to live there for a couple of years. Some lovely surroundings to enjoy. Why not try and embrace the experience?

[Gordy M]

Lots of lower division teams do this, Elgin, Stranraer, QotS etc. I thinks its quite common.

[Sergio sledge]

Incredible. They claim this is to attract players as they won't move to Inverness.

Ross County seem to manage. It will rip the heart out of the club. Why bother supporting your local club if they are not local any more. What about developing local talent. Disgraceful decision.

Imagine if we moved our training base to Bournemouth!

Pretty much universal opposition to this move up here, which is a pretty unusual thing for a football club to achieve. I suppose they were calling for unity earlier in the week.... Most folks would rather see the club part-time playing local guys than full time but with no connection to the city/area other than 1 game every two weeks.

Pretty much all home advantage is gone as every game will be an away game and any connection between the squad and the community will be gone. Never mind the logistical nightmare of trying to integrate local players from the youth programme into the first team when they train 135 miles away.

Gardiner has ruined ICTFC.

[AgentDaleCooper]

From what they've said, you can pretty much lay the blame for this squarely at the door of AirBnB. Hopefully people with such assets will start to realise what they are doing to the highlands :aok:

[Crab apple]

A lot of ICT fans are very unhappy with their CEO Scott Gardiner who was CEO of the jambos for a few years. Under his tenure they have appointed big Dunc, been relegated and now this move.

[Scotty Leither]

A lot of ICT fans are very unhappy with their CEO Scott Gardiner who was CEO of the jambos for a few years. Under his tenure they have appointed big Dunc, been relegated and now this move.

Karma’s a cruel mistress, eh? A bigger slaver you’ll struggle to find than he. Wonder if his mates at BBC shortbread will be indulging his excuses for relegation or “demotion” this time round?

[Gus]

From what they've said, you can pretty much lay the blame for this squarely at the door of AirBnB. Hopefully people with such assets will start to realise what they are doing to the highlands :aok:

Way I read it. Wages they will pay for 1 or 2 year deals there just isn't the accommodation for the players & they "calibre" of players they want to attract/need in the local area

This is for first team. Youth teams etc will still be local. ICT are not going to have their own facility like Hibs where all go onto the same site so don't see the issue

HTC is 13 miles from ER ;-)

Match day logistics will be interesting though

[wallpaperman]

I can understand ICT fans being a bit dumbstruck by this, but I don’t think this is an awful idea to be honest.

[Billy Whizz]

I can understand ICT fans being a bit dumbstruck by this, but I don’t think this is an awful idea to be honest.

They’d be cheaper playing at Kelty too

[Since452]

Scot Gardiner classic. Just a surprise they aren't training at the Oriam with his favourites.

[Chorley Hibee]

Scot Gardiner classic. Just a surprise they aren't training at the Oriam with his favourites.

Got his Hearts mixed up.

He does have form for not ordering seats for a stand, so every possibility he's made that error too.

[JimBHibees]

Bit of a shame feels like their identity is being lost a bit. Their crowds have been pretty dire for a while wee bit of a surprise given they were in the Scottish cup final last season

[He's here!]

Bit of a shame feels like their identity is being lost a bit. Their crowds have been pretty dire for a while wee bit of a surprise given they were in the Scottish cup final last season

Their identity has always felt a bit forced, being a merger of two clubs.

[JimBHibees]

Their identity has always felt a bit forced, being a merger of two clubs.

Which is true. Some of the fans of some of the clubs refused to watch the new team

[Rumble de Thump]

They can't be struggling for somewhere to stay when they're allowed to wild camp.

[marinello59]

Lots of lower division teams do this, Elgin, Stranraer, QotS etc. I thinks its quite common.

Aye, I know Elgin City do this. It’s hard to attract players there, anything they can do to reduce the travel time for central belt players helps. It’s usually means half the squad trains locally and half at a remote location, not ideal but needs must.

[Booker5time]

Which is true. Some of the fans of some of the clubs refused to watch the new team

No way to back this up, but i always got the feeling. that the inverness public has not really taking to the team no matter the sucess they had on the park since mearging.

If one of them had got into the league and had the sucess inverness has had, they havebetter support by now.

Also dose not help that ground they bult has always had a tempory feel about it, not sure it was the best location for a new ground either,

[Haymaker]

Part of the reasoning is that they struggle to attract players to Inverness, players that don’t want to move their family to Inverness may be tempted to join if they were only to travel to Kelty to train.
They would only travel to Inverness for home games which they may have to do with another team anyway so it does make sense.It totally does make sense. If I remember correctly a lot of lower league teams train in the central belt.

Announcing it like this is utterly ****ing stupid though.

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[B.H.F.C]

My mate played for Montrose but they trained at Kinross.

This is a wee bit different because Inverness are a full time team. Will hazard a guess they won’t be for much longer and this could be the beginning of the end for them.

[Forza Fred]

Not sure it matters greatly where they train…….as long as their home stadium is in Inverness.

Lower league clubs have done this for years…….and the concept of ‘training grounds’ for bigger clubs means they don’t see the stadium until match days either.

Presumably they’ve crunched the numbers and think this is the least worst compromise, so good luck to them.

I can se a lot of changes coming in the not too distant future to Scottish football that will be questioned….shared stadiums being a big one.

Not sure for how long some clubs are going to be able to pay the maintenance costs on an
asset that only gets used once a fortnight for part of the year……but that is for another day.

[Bridge hibs]

Not sure it matters greatly where they train…….as long as their home stadium is in Inverness.

Lower league clubs have done this for years…….and the concept of ‘training grounds’ for bigger clubs means they don’t see the stadium until match days either.

Presumably they’ve crunched the numbers and think this is the least worst compromise, so good luck to them.

I can se a lot of changes coming in the not too distant future to Scottish football that will be questioned….shared stadiums being a big one.

Not sure for how long some clubs are going to be able to pay the maintenance costs on an an asset that only gets used once a fortnight for part of the year……but that is for another day.Yep, hibs are Edinburgh/Leith and we train in East Lothian

I think we should go back to training on the dug **** parks of the JKC again 🫣

My mate played for Berwick Rangers for years and trained in Edinburgh and East Lothian

Dunfermline actually trained often at the Jewel and Esk college and on occasion trained on the pitch at Joppa quarry, my team played a wee bounce game against them as we were training in Joppa at the same time

[Coach Jon]

Yep, hibs are Edinburgh/Leith and we train in East Lothian

I think we should go back to training on the dug **** parks of the JKC again 🫣

My mate played for Berwick Rangers for years and trained in Edinburgh and East Lothian

Dunfermline actually trained often at the Jewel and Esk college and on occasion trained on the pitch at Joppa quarry, my team played a wee bounce game against them as we were training in Joppa at the same time

Berwick Rangers still train in Edinburgh. What you have to remember is the majority of teams in the Lower Leagues are part time, so not the staff/players main job, many working full time jobs in the Central Belt.
Not many players would fancy having to do a round trip of 100+ miles to train after work. I would imagine ICT will probably looking to cut costs after relegation, so may be only offering part time contracts to many.

[chrisski33]

Yep, hibs are Edinburgh/Leith and we train in East Lothian

I think we should go back to training on the dug **** parks of the JKC again 🫣

My mate played for Berwick Rangers for years and trained in Edinburgh and East Lothian

Dunfermline actually trained often at the Jewel and Esk college and on occasion trained on the pitch at Joppa quarry, my team played a wee bounce game against them as we were training in Joppa at the same time

Reckon we should train on the dug parks again as seemed to do better on game day unlike nowadays!

[Bridge hibs]

Reckon we should train on the dug parks again as seemed to do better on game day unlike nowadays!

Never helped us in the late 70s and 80s, the boot boys would have had their work cut out in those days 🤢

[Since452]

Part of the reasoning is that they struggle to attract players to Inverness, players that don’t want to move their family to Inverness may be tempted to join if they were only to travel to Kelty to train.
They would only travel to Inverness for home games which they may have to do with another team anyway so it does make sense.

Tough cookies. They decided to amalgamate with another Inverness team and join the league. They knew where they were based. If I was a fan of another league one club I'd be quite pissed off at the thought of them potentially nicking a player they were interested in because they've decided to train in Fife, a hundred odd miles from where they're from.

[Pretty Boy]

No way to back this up, but i always got the feeling. that the inverness public has not really taking to the team no matter the sucess they had on the park since mearging.

If one of them had got into the league and had the sucess inverness has had, they havebetter support by now.

Also dose not help that ground they bult has always had a tempory feel about it, not sure it was the best location for a new ground either,

The Inverness public definitely hasn't taken to them.

There was real opposition from both sets of fans. Caledonian fans felt they were big enough and good enough to go it alone. Inverness Thistle fans felt and still feel sidelined as their colours were red and black and they feel Caledonian's blue was given undue prominence and has become the identity of the new team. Iirc Clachnacuddin were also discussed as being part of the merger.

I just don't think it's possible to create a new football team from scratch in the modern day and get that sense of belonging you get with clubs that have been around since the 19th century. Livingston have the same problem and MK Dons are the same down south. It's why the calls for merger of multiple smaller clubs in Scotland are nonsensical. If you remove all the emotion and identity a merged Hibs and Hearts makes sense, in reality it's bonkers. The same is true of merging Raith, Dunfermline, Cowndebeath and East Fife into Fife Athletic or Brechin, Arbroath and Forfar into Angus County. Their fans are no more going to support it than we would support Edinburgh United or the Inverness public have supported ICT.

[whiskyhibby]

Incredible. They claim this is to attract players as they won't move to Inverness.

Ross County seem to manage. It will rip the heart out of the club. Why bother supporting your local club if they are not local any more. What about developing local talent. Disgraceful decision.

Imagine if we moved our training base to Bournemouth!


Ross County have a wealthy benefactor and argueably a less costly place to live, it makes perfect sense for me , good on them

[Forza Fred]

Next they’ll be having pre season training camps in Portugal and playing friendlies there!

Disgraceful!

[jacomo]

Get what you mean but I wouldn't care if we trained on the moon if it meant success on the park.


Hmm… let’s move our training base to Glasgow then, players can commute over to Edinburgh for home matches.

[we are hibs]

See this has now been canned and the Inverness chairman has resigned after fans said they'd boycott at it would cost the club around 250k.

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[PatHead]

See this has now been canned and the Inverness chairman has resigned after fans said they'd boycott at it would cost the club around 250k.

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Good

[Fuzzywuzzy]

Queen of the south train at hamilton

[PatHead]

Queen of the south train at hamilton

That is working well for them.

[Pretty Boy]

See this has now been canned and the Inverness chairman has resigned after fans said they'd boycott at it would cost the club around 250k.

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I think the fact that the decision to sign the agreement wasn't Kelly's to make since they don't own the land has played a significant part as well.

There are still questions surrounding the £250K car park money as well.

[Viva_Palmeiras]

Still leaves them with a lengthy and awkward journey to Inverness for 'home' games. Will the club put them up in hotels the night before?!

Changed days from when Jim McLean insisted all United players must live in Dundee.

Personally I don't get the reluctance to live there for a couple of years. Some lovely surroundings to enjoy. Why not try and embrace the experience?

Inverness is the fastest growing city in Europe a colleague told me who lives in Dingwall.
When he moved up there was only 6 properties to rent in the Inverness and surrounding Res. Housing shortage.

I wonder if the best local players are actually heading to Ross County? Obv embarrassing.

[hibstag]

Tough cookies. They decided to amalgamate with another Inverness team and join the league. They knew where they were based. If I was a fan of another league one club I'd be quite pissed off at the thought of them potentially nicking a player they were interested in because they've decided to train in Fife, a hundred odd miles from where they're from.

That’s not quite right they are a team formed by the dissolution of Inverness Caledonian and Inverness Thistle to pool assets to form Caledonian Thistle , Inverness was added to the title years later, their desire to be seen as a new entity led to the ground being placed technically outside the city causing issues for home fans ever since it’s a long walk from the pub…

[marinello59]

Inverness is the fastest growing city in Europe a colleague told me who lives in Dingwall.
When he moved up there was only 6 properties to rent in the Inverness and surrounding Res. Housing shortage.

I wonder if the best local players are actually heading to Ross County? Obv embarrassing.

The only reason players are choosing Ross a county over ICT is the respective leagues they are in. As for a pool of local players, it’s much more limited than the central belt. All the teams from North of Aberdeen who left the Highland league have struggled due to their location. ICT and Ross County have had the pick of the North and Peterhead have benefitted from being close to Aberdeen with them getting plenty of loan players from AFC over the years. Elgin City have struggled more than the rest as they really are the most isolated, a major factor in their inability to perform anywhere near the standards of the other ex HL teams. In their case a return to the Highland League would have made sense.

[Since452]

Maybe we should move our training base to London or the Midlands. Might be able to attract a better quality of player, they wouldn't need to relocate to Scotland and they could just pop up the road for games.

Sounds ludicrous.

[marinello59]

Maybe we should move our training base to London or the Midlands. Might be able to attract a better quality of player, they wouldn't need to relocate to Scotland and they could just pop up the road for games.

Sounds ludicrous.

It may look daft to those based in the central belt but but attracting people to live in more rural areas is difficult in all sectors, not just football. Trying to get a new generation of teachers, Doctors, Dentists etc to base themselves in areas far away from the perceived ‚action’ is genuinely difficult and creative solutions have to be found.

[we are hibs]

Looks like they might be about to go into Administration

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[Paulie Walnuts]

It may look daft to those based in the central belt but but attracting people to live in more rural areas is difficult in all sectors, not just football. Trying to get a new generation of teachers, Doctors, Dentists etc to base themselves in areas far away from the perceived ‚action’ is genuinely difficult and creative solutions have to be found.

:agree:

Don’t think it was a terrible idea at all.

[Brightside]

Looks like they might be about to go into Administration

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aye heard the same.

[Carheenlea]

https://i.postimg.cc/c1Ty4fDB/IMG-3428.jpg (https://postimg.cc/K4Ks03h1)

[He's here!]

Looks like they might be about to go into Administration

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They should consider disbanding the club and reverting to the two teams which amalgamated to create it. It would mean a return to Highland League football, but long-term it might create a more viable, better supported team from Inverness which could take the step up.

[Lago]

They should consider disbanding the club and reverting to the two teams which amalgamated to create it. It would mean a return to Highland League football, but long-term it might create a more viable, better supported team from Inverness which could take the step up.
Ludicrous idea, cost?, stadium?, club officials? and players?

[Sergio sledge]

:agree:

Don’t think it was a terrible idea at all.

I think it made sense if they are going to be part time, the pool of players available who are working and good enough is going to be much larger in the central belt, but when they are offering full time contracts there's certainly a lot of feeling that if people don't want to be in Inverness then they shouldn't be signing to play for the club.

For a lot of people this only adds to the feeling that a lot of Highlanders have of being ignored and looked down upon by people in the central belt who automatically assume everything is better there. Of course there are issues recruiting people to the highlands, we have the same problems in our company, but ICTFC's best teams always had a core of local players who lived and worked here and who bought into the highlands as a place to live. To me it just smacks of lazy recruiting and it's laziness to be blaming it on the lack of accommodation.

They have been mismanaged so badly, apparently they were spending £20,000 a month on accommodation for staff, that's outrageous. Given the background of ownership of the club (people who made their money in property development and construction) it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of this money is going to them.

They started a concert company a few years ago which collapsed with huge debts and left a lot of local businesses out of pocket, further exacerbating the ill feeling that the poor performances on the park were creating amongst locals.

They also have put all their financial eggs into the battery storage and park-and-ride plans which seem to have collapsed (or hit hurdles) in part because of shoddy decision making and shady practices from the directors.

There's a lot of feeling that administration wouldn't be the worst thing for the club to get rid of the owners and Gardiner and start a fresh, but as always in administration there will be businesses shafted by it and ordinary club employees who will lose their jobs.

To be fair though, there probably just isn't the space up here for 2 clubs trying to compete in the premiership or championship. Both clubs have been loss making for a long time and rely on shareholders writing off loans or injecting capital to continue. Especially when most of the fans are also fans of other clubs (mainly Rangers and Celtic).

[Musselbound]

It's a tough one with no easy solution. I can understand the fans anger but hopefully it was made clear to them that going part time or into administration might be the alternative.

I don't know what their current training facilities at Fort George are like but I originally come from the Inverness area and would not imagine they are great.

[Carheenlea]

I enjoyed the trip up to there for the cup tie last season, but there was a kind of coldness about the club that you don’t feel over at Ross County.

When in Dingwall you feel a bit of the historical traditions of Highland League football and a club that has made the transition to SFL status and have a bit of vibrancy about the place, which you don’t really feel at ICT now.

I’d quite happily never have to go back to the Caledonian Stadium.