Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 17 July 2012

17 July 2012

So, the Grimsby Telegraph broke the story last week. The BBC runs with it today, and there are even quotes about it from Speedin' John (Hotrod). But at the time of writing, your original/regular Diary is yet to read a word about Fentydome II from any official GTFC-related source. Still, there it is in black and white from Auntie. The council is going to assess a proposed new site for the new stadium Town have been fart-arsing about over since the early 1990s.

The dribbling out of news about Fentydome II seems pretty much of a piece with the way business has been done at Blundell Park under its namesake non-chairman. He said Neil Woods had his full support and sacked him a day later. He said the club wouldn't pay up players' contracts before they ran out, and then paid up Charles Ademeno's, Dwayne Samuels', Lee Ridley's, Darran Kempson's, Rob Eagle's, Damian Spencer's and Serge Makofo's contracts before they ran out. He said there was no alternative to his proposed Fentydome I site at Great Coates, and now he's looking at a site off Peaks Parkway. While we're at it, I'm not sure "a breath of fresh air" is necessarily the aptest phrase to use next to a crematorium.

Anchor tenant? Anchor tenant? Refreshingly, there's no talk this time of an "enabling retail development". All we see is "a leisure complex and football stadium". The Tory-worsened recession, of course, was what did for Fentydome I. Perhaps Grimsby people are postponing the purchase of luxury items like televisions and bread so they can take care of their basic needs such as step aerobics.

In other Fenty news that we've found out about almost by accident, our glorious non-leader has been doing his bit for the game by vetoing financial fair play proposals. Where? In an excellent interview with Boston United chairman David Newton. Newton reveals that the Football Conference recently attempted to make clubs pay their way instead of running up huge debts to chairmen, but that a certain John Shelton Fenty was instrumental in defeating the proposals. "He wants to continue sticking money into a football club that is not sustainable," sniffed Newton, accurately.

"One day all football clubs will be run like Grimsby Town," I imagine Fenty retorting, his eyes fixed dreamily on the horizon in contemplation of his years of exemplary work at Blundell Park.

In non-Fenty news, Town's reserve team is to take part in a proper league system again. Last summer GTFC announced we couldn't afford to run a regular stiffs XI any more, and would just play the odd friendly here and there to keep the fringe players sharp. This year, the Mariners' finances clearly transformed completely, we're back in the Central League. Actually, that does sound suspiciously like Fenty news, doesn't it.

And with reserve fixtures to take place at Bradley. Ooooh, get you.

Finally today, Graham King has emailed with the screenshot below, to ask simply: "What on Earth is going on with the SNOS?" It's not clear whether Graham is disturbed by Town's website having seemingly switched codes to cricket or actually getting some words right (apart from "Call All Cricket Fans - WE have managed to acquired to places", of course). Either way, if the club is represented accurately by its superb new official website, then we're still struggling to muster much faith in Fentydome II being built properly - or indeed at all.