Cod Almighty | Match Report

by Tony Butcher

3 March 2021

Grimsby Town 0 Leyton Orient 1

Payne alone is a painful way to begin. Is it really a good idea to start at the Parslow Point?

First half – The bad beginning

The disorienteers kicked off towards the Pontoon and straight out of play. Town headed straight down the other end and Waterfall headed Thompson. Three minutes of medical musings and Thompson headed straight off to hospital, replaced by Happe. Yes, as we suspected, Orient had been Happe-less from the start.

iFollow! But! iFollow only if you be of valour, for the events of this game are so foul, so cruel that no person yet has watched it and lived! If you do doubt your courage or your strength, come no further!

El Miz was mugged in the middle and drains were blocked by a flushed, disposable napping centre-back. Woe, woe our cup of woe runneth over and into the sand dunes. A dribbling drubbler from Morais of such inconsequence that it may have been a Situationist art installation. Town are merely a tool for the liberation of everyday life, a method of negating the pervasive alienation that accompanies the spectacle, as they used to say in the Nunny Tavern.

Hewitt? Whither Hewitt? Into the aching acreage of absence Brophy waltzed and winked. Johnson slapped against Waterfall then slopped against Menayese as Eastwood dived behind the sofa. Bemoaning, bewailing, be patient. Our borrowed Beesman made a bee line for the bye-line and rolled to the pinned Payne at the near post who fancy flicked to the ghost of Peter Beagrie.

Filipe, your legs move but we can't see that you're playing.

Rotten, rotting, no long potting, just accidental snookers behind the bike sheds. No method, just the madness of risible timidity.

A red free kick flipped and Eastwood flapped his fingers, for in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make. And so began a series of unfortunate events as the jolly Johnny Leytons had a corner. El-Miz sliced the first, Brophy shot the shortened second against striped shorts and the third was shortened even further in the far corner. Matete and Adams were flummoxed by fancy feet, Morais counted sheep, the cross deflected slowly into the centre and in lumbered Happe to shin into the bottom right corner.

Matete mashed through the middle and passed pifflingly through the vacancy of strikers. Yes, sir he can boogie and that's the collective name down our neck of the woods.

Saved by the bobbles as Brophy shinned after Morais melted and Hewitt hid. We have got 11 players on the pitch haven't we? We're all seeing red.

Straw men clutching straws. El-Miz shin-swiping wide and high, Waterfall heading very wide at a corner, Waterfall headed very high at a corner. Is this the last straw?

Reds sly on the right and almost a delight. Johnson smershed, Eastwood pattercaked, Johnson followed and failed as many Mariners sailed in to dock with his socks.

Eastwood nearly passed to them, a two wood to Payne stuck in the bunker. Two snapshots of nothingness that epitomised this lobotomised travesty.

Stood under an amber moon, we simply ask will we see him soon? Hello, calling Mr Elliott Hewitt. Has anyone seen Elliott Hewitt? Perhaps he took the last bus home after Waterfall's rancid big boomer left us exposed on the right. Brophy danced in the moonlight, roaming on our right, passed to Kemp by the penalty spot, who swiped against the bar.

Two minutes were added. It's one way to keep the score down.

There we are. Harrogate redux.

We'll return before you can say antidisestablishmentarianism.

Second half – The slippery slope

Antidistibilitsmin... anti-misty-linstimbl... anti-stids... anti-distinctly-minty-monetarism...

Neither team made any changes at half time.

From the off Waterfall shanked a slice straight up in the air. What a load of old bobbles.

So, what's it like in hibernation? Well, it's exactly like being asleep. You have absolutely no sense of time. The only difference is that you don't dream. What is there to dream about?

Matate slipped and the Orienteers spun their own yarn to avoid scoring.

What are Town? A collection of dots.

Double nutmegs on the Rabbit and Meyanese. Please put us out of this misery. Stop this world we want to get off.

What kind of team is this? An empty shell, a tolling bell in which our empty hearts dwell.

What do we want? Free false teeth for all!

Doh! Nutmegs again. Why? Because we're sad and lonely down our right again. A slow, low pass across the face of goal, Meyanese missed, Adams poked against our own bar and Eastwood rabbit-punched away from red heads.

Just where is Joe Bunney? Just what is Joe Bunney? Is it just to pick on the rabbit?

Town's invisible army disappeared. A cross by Kemp rolling past Rollin and the stone circles as two red kites flew nearby.

Stop. Stop, will you? Stop. Will you stop? Stop, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it.

Halfway through the half double subbing happened so fast. Let's have a blast as off came Rose and Payne. Big booming, Big Jim heading and Lennie the lion volleyed widely high.

Hello Lamy, where did you come from? 4-4-2, wingers winging, the tactical shackles released. Things began to happen at last.

Lamy crossed and Morais watched the wheels go by. Matete mugged, Hanson slid the Shop slyly down the side and Lennie did slap against the outside of the near and rightist post.

Matete mutated into a midfield maestro swiping, swaying and swinging to Lamy on the left. A cross and in a momentary lapse of reason many believed in miracles. Oh Lamy, you sexy thing.

Credit where credit's due. Well done Mr Meyanese.

The red wall started to crumble, after all it's just an illusion, a marketing exercise to make you believe there is no hope. Big Jim flicked, Lamy lilted a lovely little swinger and Lennie glanced straight into the vicinity of Vigouroux's midriff.

Oh, is that it? 10 minutes of giving it a go after giving it all away. Well, some of them are just boys and don't know how to play. The game sailed away, sailed away.

As Town de-manned holes appeared in our desert. Off they broke and Brophy cross-shot between two reds and the post. Fiddling and piddling at a throw-in, Matete messed and a pass back from the bye-line was passed wide.

Two minutes added, played out in the scoreboard corner, as Meyanese shoved aside some cockernee rebels. The last chuck of the Town dice dropped under the coffee table as Hewitt's hurl hit the first redhead on the right.

Town: timid, supine and miserably micawberish. One up front at home? A poverty of ambition. Rage, rage against the dying of the light, oh such frail deeds, has he not taken heed of the past?