Cod Almighty | Diary

On the chaise longue all day long on the chaise longue

24 September 2021

BOTB diary here, giving the news, reviews and the tortured blues ahead of the massive Bananananarama clash with Maidenhead upon the morrow. There's something about the word "Maidenhead" that seems to encourage such verbosity. "Referee, one suspects from your ocular inadequacy that you are a practising onanist! You're clearly advocating for the Maidenhead! Spatial awareness, Waterfall! Approach me and instigate a fracas if you consider yourself physically capable, my good man!" I bet if Oscar Wilde had been a football fan he would have supported Maidenhead.

The Maidens manager is of course Alan Devonshire, who some of you will remember playing for West Ham in the 1970s and 1980s. He's changed a bit since then. No pictures in his attic, one suspects. It's always a bit confusing when you don't see someone for 30 years and suddenly someone else's grandad appears claiming to be them. At least Alan Brazil has the decency to still look like Alan Brazil, even if it is an Alan Brazil that has over-ripened, fallen off the tree and been pecked at by birds.

Anyhoo, Devonshire – or the man masquerading as him - is filled with foreboding about tomorrow's clash. "We've got knocks" he says gravely, "though we won't say which players as that would alert the opposition." I'd like to think that we won't give a flying burrito brother about which players have knocks because we are Grimsby and they are Maidenhead, and if they had all been eating nothing but Huel in a health farm wrapped in bubble wrap for the last six months we'd still be favourites. Being a Grimsby fan I feel churned up inside writing in such an optimistic way. I hope I ain't cursed nothing.

We will of course be taking our fantastic away support. Although I deal mainly in poor research, cynicism and irrelevant bollocks, when I talk about this topic I have to go all Grimsby Telegraph and just swoon with admiration. It's a long trip and if you are on your way may God assist you with sweet wings upon your feet. You are the beating heart of this club. I'm so old and knackered a trip to the garden centre feels like an ordeal, and I can only doff my cap at your dedication. Help the Mighties bring back some points and I will be forever in your debt.

In the meantime, is your mother worried? Would you like us to assign someone to worry your mother?

I'm off to spend the rest of my day on the chaise longue. Tomorrow I may tune in to the new-fangled wireless and hear how the Grimsby Pelham are faring against Maidenhead in the sporting skirmish of the decade. The Earl of Yarborough has promised to bring a few plucked pheasants and a bottle of port for luncheon, and the contest will make a most entertaining epilogue. All rally behind the stripes!