Andy’s Sting in the Tale (08/05/26) "County Down"
- Andy Smith
- 5 days ago
- 9 min read
No, This is not a column praising the birthplace of George Best, Rory McIlroy and my Great, Great, Grannie Catherine Charleton, (no connection I know of to the more renowned Bobby and Jack).
No it’s the sad summary of a season where County started as favourites and flopped.
We all now know that there will be no Highland Derby next season after ICT closed out the SPFL1 and County
slipped silently from the Championship.
One of my old pals, a staunch County fan, dropped me a note and I’ll share some of his insight.
“I’m saddened by what’s happened and just feel Roy Macgregor has done a great job for the club and the town but has got it all wrong.
What if all his investment hadn’t been on wages for people with no links to the town.
What if it had all gone into the building our community, strengthening our community teams, so every guy/girl/kid/youth/man/woman who wanted could take part and for free?
Instead of fighting to always be somewhere that was never sustainable and will cause grief when he’s gone.
Us being a slave to ‘elite aspirations’ just piles on the pressures”.
My pal is right about so many things in that wee para because football measures the wrong kinds of success.
Short termism and instant glory dominate and once the money has been spent the piggy bank is empty.
I was reminded of a recent, brief, conversation with Alan Savage the businessman who recently saved my childhood team, ICT.
I shook his hand, thanked him and said I only had one request.
He smiled and asked what it was.
I said, knowing about the almost constant financial turmoil post the marriage of Jags and Caley.
“Please right-size the club”, Alan.
He smiled again because he has been close to the club and seen at first-hand the carnage uncontrolled ambition did, on several occasions.
I also said ICT should be about the town first and foremost and become part of the real fabric.
That’s why this week I heard Alan speaking with Phil on Radio Scotland.
His wisdom about his task being about making the most of the asset struck a chord with me.
Using the facilities at our grounds 1 day a fortnight makes no sense.
And this was no moonbeam nonsense like the previous CEO and his battery storage to sneak planning permission for a pal, or his car park wheeze or moving to bloody Kelty.
ICT by good fortune are located right at the start of the North Coast 500 and Alan said he can see that being factored in to a sustainable business plan.
The club are on the up and I hope they avoid the impostor syndromic frenzy that gave them such a troubled past.
And finally here’s a wee smile for broken hearted County fans.
It’s a memory, just, of a wonderful radio advert I heard 40 years or more ago on Moray Firth Radio when Titch McCooey reigned supreme.
The tune is ‘Brochan Lom’, the well-known rhythmic Gaelic nonsense song about ‘thin porridge’.
And apologies to people who live in Beauly.
“Broken down, broken down ,broken down in Beauly,
Broken down, broken down, broken down in Beauly,
Broken down, broken down, broken down in Beauly,
Tow it back, tow it back tow it back to Dingwall.
And then the Invernesian/Black Isle-ish voice-over tells you how good Macrae and Dicks on Station Road are when you are in trouble.
Spelt trubbel.
When the ad ran County were an up and down enigma in the old Highland League.
You’re way beyond that now guys and will find your own level.
The highland derbies will return.
This Week’s Sting
1. World Cup Stuff and Nonsense
2. All to Play For
3. Coming to a Firestick Near you
4 DAO’s Need More
5 Scotland Flags in the Sun
6.Chitter Chatter Season
1. Just £7,500 Per Foot soldier In the Land Of King Donald
The BBC reckoned this week that the average Tartan Army fan will have to shell out £7,500 to be there and take in our three guaranteed matches and this small fortune covers reasonable rather than expensive tastes.
And, what’s worse is its costing us more than £1K more than our neighbouring Engerland fans because Boston and Miami are not cheap.
I learned that in Fifa’s dynamic resale market tickets for our matches v Haiti and Morocco are falling from the original highway robbery.
But Brazil briefs have nearly double at over £1200.
The average monthly wage in Brazil is $600 and Morrocco is $500 but you have to feel sorry for any Haiti fans where the average is $100 per month and it would take 6 months’ work just to buy a ticket for our opener.
We’re not the only angry fans about Infantino’s nonsense.
Argentinians are famous travellers so much so that there is still a zone in Qatar called The Argentinian Quarter after the last World Cup.
Pablo Albarrio, a well-respected Argentinian sociologist and writer said this week, “We are a poor country, a failed country, but we are the best fans. People are going into debt. Fifa’s dynamic pricing is abusing fan passion to make a business”.
This week Infantino came out with some crap justifying the prices saying, “In USA you cannot watch a college match for less than $300. This is the World Cup”.
Fact checking would disagree with him.
I hope he is running scared.
Here’s an insight from a particularly knowledgeable USA fan on comments below an article I read in the NYT.
1. The tickets are obscenely overpriced.
2. The hotels are obscenely overpriced.
3. It takes forever to reach the venues and/or the cost to get to them is obscenely overpriced.
4. Fifa is obscenely corrupt.
5. Donald Trump’s grubby fingerprints are all over the entire event so in no particular order his crimes against, decency & humanity, immigration, self-aggrandizement, self-enrichment, bullying, threatening, slandering, and lying about our allies, January 6th, war mongering, sexual assault, Fifa Peace Prize, did I mention self-aggrandizement, or self-enrichment?
I’m already exhausted thinking about how tacky and tawdry and grossly overdone it all is.
Our USA is seriously unpopular now. It doesn’t help having a xenophobic bigot as President, a man who spends his time insulting the countries whose tourist dollars we need.
the fan said more but I think you get the gist.
It tells you that some Americans are watching in horror.
Meanwhile hotels in most host cities report significantly lower than expected demand for rooms.
And it looks like the $30 Billion host-city ‘bonanza’, promised by bold Jahnnie looks like being moonbeams.
At times like this I am tainted by the guilty pleasure of schadenfreude and hope the two besties get what they deserve.
2. No European Finals but a Great Domestic Finish
OK, looking over the border we can see that our nearest neighbours have a team in each of the three Uefa finals.
For what it’s worth good luck to Arsenal, Villa, and Palace.
I’m jealous because I remember when we bred home grown teams who were among the best.
Our performances in Europe this year were on analysis risible but maybe the competitiveness at the top will be a foundation for improvement.
But at least we have an uber competitive finish in our two top leagues, and Hearts currently have it to lose in both.
No easy games or certainties and I know Rangers will react like a cornered pit bull on Sunday.
Special mentions to my old team ICT for the turn around and real progress, and well done Kilby.
East Kilbride really deserves to have a significant SPFL team and they and other aspirants like Spartans are a template for well-run and progressive community clubs.
3. Play-Off Channel Goes Live
I am so supportive of the move this year to have all the play-offs live on Premier Sports.
A bargain at £12.99 per month or free if you have invested in a dodgy Amazon Firestick.
I’ll be torn tomorrow between watching Spartans seek to overturn Clyde, and Brora at home to Edinburgh City.
I’ve always had a soft spot for the ‘wee Rangers’ and even played for them a couple of times in friendlies back in the mid ‘70s.
Dudgeon Park will be alive.
4. DAOs
A movement worth supporting.
Before yesterday DAO meant two things to me.
DAO, a wonderful full-bodied wine area in the central Portugal mountains.
And DAO-ism an ancient Chinese philosophy and religion emphasising living in harmony in the natural spontaneous and flowing heart of the Universe.
Yesterday at McDiarmid Park The Scottish Football Union’s very own Alastair Blair, Stuart Murphy and Stephen Reside met with DAOs from most clubs and key speakers like, St Johnstone CEO Fran Smith, Ashley Reid, CEO of Scottish Para Football, Derek Allison of Falkirk Foundation, Owain Davies CEO of Level Playing Field, our own Stephen and Keith Ferguson, DAO at Hearts.
What was it all about?
There will be more on our web site but the essence was, “How do we create a level playing field for disabled fans and players in Scotland.
We all know that football is riven with and driven by self interest but yesterday’s meeting was the first get together by important people in this ball park in over 2 years and will go from strength to strength.
There is so much that can be done.
Stuart Murphy, ex Chair at Dundee and our CEO said, “We are happy to work with the DAOs and to continue the fight for those with visible and non-visible disabilities as well as the quite amazing para footballers who deserve more support from the authorities and fans across Scotland”.
And Ashley Reid made an incredibly valid point.
“Scottish Football has traditionally lived in silos and the SFU, (that’s us), is very good at coaxing us out of them and bringing those with common interests together. We know there are lots of people who want to help.
And a wee flag for The SFU.
We’re different and better.
The only way that football will start to recognise and address some core issues that it is easy to ignore is to work together with people who can make a difference.
Throwing mud and playing silly B’s can be great fun but it achieves half of bugger all.
The SFU is new but we are achieving so much.
If you’re a member then your voice is being heard and thanks.
If not please sign up and be part of a movement for good and for the good of the game.
5. Viva Escocia
One of the nice things about wandering through the genuinely Spanish towns on the Island of Tenerife is seeing all the ‘Scottish’ flags on balconies and even on all the buses.
And maybe one day foreign airports will waken up to the value of business the Brits bring and stop treating us so badly because we left Europe, idiots that we were.
We really are seen as second raters and treated as such.
6. David Bowie Called it Right
Ch Ch Ch Changes.
It’s the end of the season and the gossip machines are working flat out as clubs reset and look for a better future.
Stuff like player and manager merry-go-rounds’.
Mostly nonsense like I’ve been told confidentially that Derek is ‘heading for Ibrox,’ and other gossipy noise about the comings and goings, toings and froings, ups and downs and ins and outs.
I just smile.
As they say in the Granite City, “It’s a Ballacks, min”.
If just half of the energy that goes into the eternal chatter went into analysing thinking about and actioning the future we’d be in a better place.
Andy’s Sting Blog
Written on a plane between Tenerife and Embra which has no alcohol because the morning flight out had circa 100 thirsty girls heading for pre wedding parties in the sun.
All opinions are mine and disagreement and challenges are welcome and welcomed.
If you are not a member of the SFU we need you because your voice deserves to be heard.
Andy’s Album of the Week
Van Morrison and the Chieftains : Irish Heartbeat
I can hear you think that this has nothing to do with the demise of County I talked about in the intro with the wonderful Dingwall club tumbling into the SPFL1 but one of the best tracks on this album is The Star of County Down.
I hear you groaning.
It’s a truism that if Ross County had had more or maybe even less stars they’d have been fighting it out with Saints.
This album happened after the kind of discussion you have over a beer on Van’s Irish tour when Paddy Moloney cornered him.
The what if and maybe type.
The result is an easy, synergistic and almost unique partnership between two quite distinct musical and Irish traditions.
Van was going back to his roots and Paddy and his musicians were exploring theirs outwardly.
On the album Van’s move into the jazz sphere had disappeared and his raw vocals reverted to the early days of ‘Them’.
The ‘Star of the County Down,’ the opening track, is a stand out and more to do with the traditional writer’s crush on ‘Rosie McCann from the banks o’ the Bann’ than laughing at the second year of misfortune for Roy McGregor’s team.
The only version of that particular song that comes close to Van’s is when Andrew Ranken, the Pogues drummer’s dusky vocals really hit the spot in a different way.
Shenandoah with its quite amazing Toronto Gospel choir backing track is for me the stand out among standouts, but with Raglan Road, My Lagan Love She Moved Through the Fair, and others, the whole album is mellow and rich.
And I still laugh when ‘I’ll Tell My Ma ‘ends up morphing into ‘The Sash’ with the Chieftains belting it out like it was the 12th of July.
I think it’s Van’s finest album.
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