Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Monday 24 February 2003

24 February 2003

Paul Groves, who clearly reckons he's on a roll after just signing two players in one day, has told Radio Humberside that he is now looking to secure the services of John Oster on a permanent basis. The Sunderland and Wales winger was one of the two loanees to arrive last Friday, despite his earlier insistence that he would stay and fight for a first-team spot at the Stadium of Light; and the Diary wouldn't bet against Oster lowering his expectations still further and Paul pulling it off, as the Town boss seems to know what little John wants somewhat better than the player himself. Either that or he's finally mastered the Jedi mind trick.

The recently formed Grimsby Town Supporters Trust is putting temptation in the Diary's way by unveiling a new beer to coincide with its official press launch. Town fans are invited to suggest names for the ale, developed by Tom Woods Brewery, in a Grimsby Telegraph competition; and a number of local public houses have already agreed to take the brew, says the trust. The launch is a-happening at 12:30pm on Thursday 6 March, at the Number 1 - that pub next to Cleethorpes train station - and the Diary is misty-eyed, not to mention moist-tongued, at the memory of Mariners Gold, the Town-flavoured ale once prepared by Cleethorpes brewery Willy's. For some of us, supporting Town and drinking beer go together like, er, supporting Town and being miserable.

Darren Mansaram has returned, refreshed, from Lilleshall after treatment on his ankle injury and could be set for a return to action as Town take on Division One's lack-of-form team Coventry this Saturday. Ah, Chris Thompson, it was all too brief. The Diary would love to know what actually happens at Lilleshall, for that matter, as the place has such an esoteric ring to it; the very name Lilleshall, like Lourdes, conjures up all kinds of magical, mystical, spiritual healing-type shit. Can anyone enlighten us? Email codalmightydiary@yahoo.co.uk if you can.

Town will not be signing Ipswich midfielder Jim Magilton, reports seemingly under-resourced football news outlet Teamtalk today. And there we all were thinking it was a done deal, eh.

And finally, the Diary is delighted to hear from Louis T Spangler, who sheds some light on the mystery of erstwhile Grimsby trialist Wayne Gill. Louis has tracked down Wayne to the Sports Aircraft Association of Australia, where he has been busy working on WX Decoder, a software application for decoding Australian Aviation weather briefings. The utility - available free for personal or non-commercial use - takes the standard technical briefing and rewords it into plain English. "So there we have it," writes Louis, "once again a potentially good footballer is snatched from under Grimsby Town's collective nose. When will the English FA do something about this brain drain into sports aircraft weather reporting software? The mind boggles." Isn't it always the way.