Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 6 January 2004

6 January 2004

Morning all. Mr Diary is still desk-ridden with his virulent workitis, so it's your irregular stand-in diarist Miles here. By which I mean I only get to do the diary every now and then, not that I have capricious bowels. On that front, you'll be pleased to hear that I have a poo at seven o'clock sharp every morning. Unfortunately I don't get out of bed until eight.

I have to start by mentioning - since yesterday's stand-in chose not to or forgot - the hilarious sending off of Danny Butterfield during Palace's FA Cup defeat at the weekend. Palace's Jamie Smith hacked Bobby Zamora to the ground, and the ref decided that the tackle was so bad that Butterfield deserved a red card. "A major mistake but a case of mistaken identity, which can be appealed against," says Iaiaiaiaiaian Dowie. Note that he says "can" and not "will" - he may be new at Palace, but he's not daft. Young Danny's number one detractor Andy Holt has mailed the diary with his views on this subject. "Hehe!" he says. And who can argue with that.

Another letter, this one from 'merseymariner', is right up my, the Diary's, and everyone else's street who received the excellent book Eats, Shoots And Leaves for Christmas. "Some internet users have started a 'Hockless in Campaign'," he informs us. "Which should surely be a 'Hockless In' campaign? Unless Hockless has gone to war or something? Or is there a place called Campaign? Please can the Cod Almighty pedantic diarists discuss this?" We most certainly can. Well, I can anyway. Well spotted mersey, you're absolutely right. I just don't know what they're teaching in schools these days. Tut tut. Apparently there is a place called Campaign, by the way, and it's in Tennessee. A Google search reveals that it's not a very exciting place, so I'm not sure why Hockless would want to move there from Grimsby.

A grammatically correct campaign to have Graham Hockless included in the first team would only have grown yesterday, the stumpy midfielder apparently starring as Town's reserves whupped Barnsley's 4-1. The Mariners' stiffs came from behind, as it were, thanks to two Mansaram goals, one for wee Jonny Rowan, and one for big Paul Groves, honing his playing skills, just in case the movement to have the gaffer removed from a small town in Tennessee gets its way. Some bloke called Peter Handyside featured in the Tykes' defence, incidentally. Well, well.

The Mariners squad will have another weekend of hospital visits soon, advises the official site, as Luton are too busy larging it in the FA Cup to come to Blundell Park on 24 January. We could be looking at one of them there fixture backlogs, but like Jeff Beck, I'm always one to find a silver lining, and it's this: Wrexham and now Luton will have to travel up to Cleethorpes to play a night match instead of a leisurely Saturday fixture, and that has to give the Mariners an advantage. Yup, this early in the season, and I'm already clutching at straws.

Finally, our Stace's return to fitness continues as he returned to full training yesterday. The Grimy Telegram interview type thing has an upbeat Coldicott telling us: "We did some running yesterday. We didn't get any balls out." You can't beat a bit of smutty innuendo, so I'll stop there, I think. Tra!