Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Wednesday 15 October 2003

15 October 2003

Paul Groves, who has possibly brought more black players into the Grimsby team than any other manager of the club, has issued a statement condemning racism in football as part of the game's Kick It Out week, which even York City are joining in with now. "There is no place for racism in football or in any walk of life," says yer man. "Great strides have been made in the past to get across the anti-racism message but there is still work to be done. I am pleased that the players and officials at Grimsby Town are able to join in the campaign and give our support." The week of anti-racist campaigning runs from 16 to 28 October, says Town's official website, which makes it sound more like a fortnight to me, but so much the better! "Activities at the anti-racism day will clearly spell out the club's position," adds the site - which the Diary applauds wholeheartedly, at the same time hoping GTFC stewards have finally received training on how to deal with racist chanting by spectators.

On the front of Town's official site, meanwhile, there's a picture of Graham Rodger with the words TOWN V COLCHESTER 2 KIDS FREE stamped across his face in 16-point bold, and if you click on it you can find out some team news for tonight's visit to Sheffield Wednesday. It's Graham Hockless's turn to be poorly this time, and Wes Parker's go at having one of those trendy knee injuries; while big Tony Crane could miss the visit to his alma mater with the adjacent groin osprey he picked up in last Saturday's defeat at Brighton. Up-and-coming young Welsh international Darren Barnard will replace Jason Crowe at left-back.

As one might reasonably expect from a club of their stature, Wednesday will be treating the LDV Vans Trophy with the contempt that, as the sole concern of small clubs, it so richly merits. Owls boss Chris Turner is set to field a weakened side - tempting the Diary to question whether this is even possible, having seen the XI he sent out against Town the other week. "This is just an additional fixture in an already congested fixture list," bleats Turner in the Yorkshire Post. "If Arsenal or Manchester United were in this position I am sure they would be complaining, too," he adds, and the Diary is sure he is quite right to bracket his absolutely gigantic club with such names. The Post's reporter joins in this festival of complacency and arrogance, speculating that this "snub" to the competition by such an enormous club will prompt league officials to consider scrapping the Trophy - "which has been in existence for 19 years without capturing the imagination of the public," writes the anonymous hack, who clearly needs to get out more.

Staying with tonight's match - which costs only ten of your English pounds to attend - it will be decided by 'silver goal' extra time if necessary, which every TV and radio commentator in this sector of the galaxy has decided is an obscenely complex stratagem probably devised by those shifty Brussels eurocrats to undermine our happy British way of life by baffling us all into accepting the single currency and legalised heroin. As far as the Diary understands it, however, silver goal extra time is just like normal extra time except that if one team is leading halfway though it then they win the match. Or have I missed something deeply challenging and dramatic?

Cast your mind back, reader, down the long list of tossers who have rejected loan transfers to Blundell Park, believing themselves to be just too damn special to have to lower themselves to our level. Adam Proudlock... Michael Stewart... Junior Lewis (ha ha ha)... and of course Curtis Woodhouse. The former England u21 midfielder turned down a switch to Town from Birmingham last season in favour of the bright lights of, er, Rotherham - although to be fair to the lad, he stated a wish to be nearer his hometown of Driffield. Which is 10 miles closer to Cleethorpes than to Rotherham, but hey. Any old how, you may be interested to learn that the latest chapter of Curt's quest to rediscover his roots finds our hero signing a three-year permanent contract this week with East Yorkshire's big-club-in-waiting... that's right - Peterborough.