The Diary

Cod Almighty | Diary

Why doesn't the club use a PR professional? Or even a PR hobbyist

24 November 2017

Wicklow Diary writes: It's been a busy morning at Cod Almighty with lots of Black Friday stock prepped and ready to go out the door. Simple calculations: 3,000 season ticket holders plus 2,000 floaters plus 9,000 others who didn't buy the last calendar because the parking around BP is rubbish and the bogs are a sight equals 14,000 capacity calendars. Spot on, right? Don't forget to fill yer basket in the archive section while you're here.

Sending a question to Matt Dean for the fans forum is next on the to-do list. I've a head start on this task as none of my questions were asked last time round. Let's see if they're still relevant:

  • One of the reasons sites such as Garth Lane were discounted in the SLR evaluation survey was the lack of space for enabling developments. Given that separate sites away from Peaks Parkway are now being considered for enabling developments, isn't the SLR report invalidated?
  • What gives the board the confidence that Extreme can deliver the most important project in our history and build the future of GTFC when they have no experience of football or stadia projects?
  • How did the initial contact with Extreme come about? Did other organisations show an interest in the project?

That Extreme capability question is quite apt considering orignal/regular Diary's digging on Wednesday. A bit of spit and polish and maybe the addition of 'why aren't GTFC working with the council to include the stadium as part of the town plan?' and those questions might be ready to resend. Also why doesn't the club use a PR professional. Or even a PR hobbyist. Don't forget B teams. It's not about the 'thin edge of the wedge', it's about Grimsby Town and our proud 139 years history; we should never allow our first team to play a competitive match against a B team or junior side. End of.

This could be a long forum. How long does the non-chairman intend to serve on the board? He has previously indicated that he would hand the club over under the right circumstances without repayment of his 'benign' loans. What are these conditions or circumstances? Why didn't the club publicly back the supporters after the Football League whitewash on Stevenage?

Try to get to the forum or email a question to Matt Dean in advance. I'd love to go but there's no chance I can make it. That doesn't necessarily invalidate all of my 8,000 questions. There's also the undercurrent of, put up or shut up. If you can't afford to buy out the owner, your ideas are just warrior nonsense. I may not have enough to buy the club but in addition to going to games and spending all my pocket money in the club shop, I, like many others, support the club in various other ways; by sponsoring kit, trust membership, writing for the club programme. If you have something constructive to say and can say it without calling anyone a wally, you shouldn't be dismissed as a warrior.

Speaking of constructive, if you have 15 minutes this afternoon, catch up on this series of tweets from Accy chairman Andy Holt. He has an attitude that would go far in these parts and Devon Diary has long been campaigning for us to steal him for GTFC. His hook for me were his words about not actually owning Stanley and just being the baton holder for the community asset. You may not agree with all he says and I wish he hadn't said them in The S*n but he makes some essential suggestions for the future of football outside the Premier League. 

What else have we got? It's always a treat when a Neville Butt email arrives in the CA inbox. Open Diary and the midweek Swindon fixture prompted this contribution from Neville:

I noted with interest that Open Diary remembers walking to the Swindon game at Blundell Park clasping his father's hand. It is good to hear somebody else remembers that night that brings back many happy memories as we were in the middle of a brilliant spell of goal scoring from the late Ralph Hunt. Blond-haired Ralph notched 186 goals in his career before being killed in a motor accident, but he was phenomenal in that he scored in each of the opening 10 games of a thrilling season and in 12 of the first 13 matches. We didn't achieve promotion but were fourth and the first two months were a joy.

Hunt scored a hat trick in the first midweek home game of the season against Colchester, and then played his part in the recovery from being three down at York by half time to draw 3-3, but Ralph managed to score twice with Ron Rafferty once - a Rafferty/Hunt combination that stands out among the annals of Grimsby Town. Hunt bagged 33 League goals and Rafferty a mere 24.

The Mariners played Swindon the following season in November but also a midweek game. We won both matches. The first 3-0 with Hunt on target once, with our one and only World Cup player Johnny Scott hitting the back of the net twice including one from the spot. The second year was a much closer affair and we scraped home 3-2 with Williams (two) and Jimmy Fell on the scoreboard.

I mention the second match because I know that David "Bronco" Layne was playing for Swindon at the time. A very good player but one who moved to Bradford City and then Sheffield Wednesday. Layne, together with England internationals Kay and Swan were involved in a headline catching betting scandal, with disclosures made every week, with fans queueing up to read the next instalment. I think The People was the paper slowly releasing the "news". The meeting place for the "Chair" and the "Committee" was the Salutation Inn in Doncaster.

Not travelling from Bradford tonight but hope that Grimsby play some carefree football. Would we mind if they lost 5-4?

Thank you as always for sharing, Neville. Town did play some carefree football and we didn't have to lose to do so.

It's Barnet tomorrow. It will seem odd to go there inflatable-less and without a Mariachi band in tow, just a team buoyed by Tuesday's stonking win. One that had me out of the chair and shirt-off round the kitchen in a style that not seen in our house since Podge's 96th-minute equaliser against Chester.

It's a massive game, Jeff. Barnet had drama of their own on Tuesday night, beating Podge and Newport with two late goals. They'll be carrying similar feelings of hope into the game. Both sides will want to show that Tuesday's euphoria was not a false dawn. Let's hope we continue to play football with the attacking intent of that win. Like Neville says, would we really mind if we lost 5-4? Probably not if the applause that greeted Town despite a 2-1 deficit at half time on Tuesday is a measure. UTM.