Cod Almighty | Diary

More than any other time, this time

14 June 2018

Today's the day when football goes global. We've got an England team based in one part of Russia, and it'll have to travel to other parts of the country, literally thousands of miles apart, just to complete its three group games. I understand that the World Cup is all about bringing football to far-flung corners of the world but I get depressed when I read about how empty these purpose-built stadiums remain in countries that simply don't have the passion or the population to keep them alive once the carnival has left the town. It's almost like FIFA thinks of the money first and the fans last.

It's a bit of a rushed entry from your increasingly time-strapped West Yorkshire Diary today as there's still lots to be done in the office before everyone basically gives up at 4pm and starts watching a match they'd actively avoid if it was televised in any other circumstance. Watching Russia play Saudi Arabia has about as much appeal to me as watching Stoke play West Brom.

It's now time to bring it closer to home – much, much closer to home. Michael Jolley has brought in an assistant manager and an assistant coach and both will follow in the footsteps of the manager and relocate to the area. This commitment for players and coaching staff alike to live locally could be one of the most important features of the club's future health and I can't begin to tell you how excited I am that we have a manager who truly believes there's value in it. Finally, we seem to have a man in charge who understands football is more than a match that's played once or twice a week and is looking at every possible area in which we can steal an advantage.

It seems Jolley is stripping football back to its bare bones. Russell Slade spoke mostly rubbish, and among the pile of verbal diarrhoea you could occasionally hear some kind of insistence that we were going back to basics, but we weren't. We were going back to non-League. Basics, to me, means things like comfort. Feeling at home. Feeling like you belong. Feeling like you're in a good place, literally and mentally – and once you have that strong foundation you can begin to build from it. Getting to know your colleagues; feeling like you can trust them; rely on them; believe in them. First the camaraderie, then the confidence – people have got your back. Not just in the players, but the people who coach you, and who believe they can make you better. And the fans. These are the basics. I reckon it represents about 80 percent of football, and the rest is what you actually do on the training ground and on the football pitch.

I feel like Jolley is using this summer to get the basics right. There'll still be some to-ing and fro-ing in the transfer market, but with a squad of players that's settled in North East Lincolnshire and encouraged to socialise with each other – and the fans – much more easily, our team spirit (and that gelling period everyone obsesses about) will be far ahead of those teams where players are still trying to learn each other's names come August.

I'm not saying that this alone will win us the league, promotion or even a play-off spot. What it will do, in the short term, is build a strong bond between players and fans, which means I can go to Blundell Park and, win or lose, know that those players are giving all they've got – for each other, and for us. It's actually not all that much to ask for, but somehow these basics have been lost in a world where football has been diluted to such an extent that, for the first time in my life, I'm really not bothered about England's fortunes in Russia. Win or lose, I won't really care all that much.

My passion is – and will always be – closer to home. UTM!