Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Friday 31 January 2003

31 January 2003

It seems that Steve Livingstone may now have to swallow the red card we all wanted to stick up Mr Clattenburg's back passage. What a lovely image. GTFC have decided to give up on an appeal against the sending-off, rather than waste any more of their precious breath arguing the toss with the fatuous tit. The club had spoken to the officially stupid official about his decision, but he sat with his fingers in his ears shouting "La la la la la not listening la la la la", until everyone went away.

Anyone reading this Diary entry on their laptop from their snowbound car on the M11 might be wondering whether tomorrow's match at Fratton Park is going to go ahead. There's no official news as yet, but Cod Almighty does have an on-the-spot reporter in Portsmouth, who can reveal that there is "bright sunshine on the South coast", and that the "game will be on, no probs". He does go on, however, to inform us that it is also "fucking cold", so the Diary's advice is to pop down to Millett's and buy a pair of thermal longjohns. Whether or not the Applebys Marinermobile can make it down to Portsmouth on time is another matter...pack up your shovels in your old kitbags, boys.

Should tomorrow's game go ahead, Paul Groves will have more than one option of how to line the team up: Georges Santos (described earlier this week by a colleague as 'Thantoth the Collothuth') is now recovered from being hamstrung; news is that Galli and Macca are also back; and there is the possibility of Darren Barnard recovering from an ankle injury in the nick of time. Of the opposition, Portsmouth will be missing Gianluca Festa, Arjan De Zeeuw and Steve Stone. Well, let me fetch my violin - the club Shirley Bassey might have been singing about still have around a million fit players, including new boy Tim Sherwood, who we can only hope has a stinker of a debut.

The Portsmouth Rivals website, meanwhile, has surprised the Diary by giving the Mariners some credit: "Grimsby are a proud, if modest, club," it states, "who have defied the odds to maintain first division football at Blundell Park and they are written off lightly at any club's peril". Damn, they're not underestimating us. Still, Grovesie knows a thing or two about psychological warfare, as shown in his interview on the official site. "Portsmouth are ace!", he says, "They should beat us easy - eight nil, at least. We don't have a bloody hope of winning, you know". Ha ha! Eat that, Portsmouth!