Cod Almighty | Diary
Diary - Thursday 25 March 2004
25 March 2004
The team Paul Groves assembled last summer, which filled Town fans with so much misplaced optimism, continues to unravel with the departure today of Disco "is dead" Des Hamilton. The likeable but ultimately ineffective midfielder was signed from Cardiff in July 2003, presumably on the Handyside principle that any player leaving Lennie Lawrence on a free transfer couldn't be all that bad, but quickly infuriated Blundell Park with a poor workrate and Butterfieldesque tendency to position himself five or ten yards away from the ball at all times. After 31 appearances, no goals, and no near misses, Hamilton departs Cleethorpes by mutual consent despite having another year of his contract to run, and so presumably has a home to go to - but he leaves the Cod Almighty management vowing to think very carefully in future before deciding to sponsor another player.
Almost as exciting is the news that on-loan striker Isaiah "FIFA World" Rankin is staying with Town until the end of the season. The pacy frontman has scored twice for the Mariners in his loan from Barnsley and celebrated his recent goal against his parent club in a manner that was widely seen as dousing his bridges in several gallons of four-star as a prelude to their spectacular ignition with a molotov cocktail. Rather than having his loan extended, Rankin appears to have agreed to the termination of his contract at Oakwell and could earn a longer permanent contract with the Mariners should he continue to impress between now and the final reckoning; and because this deal means his loan will no longer count towards Town's total for the current campaign, the club remains on course to achieve its apparent target of fielding 40 different players in a single season.
After yesterday correcting its spelling at the Diary's prompting, GTFC's official site today nicks our excellent 'stretch Armstrong' reference from Tuesday in confirming that the player of that moniker will also stay at BP until at least May, though Craig's status remains essentially loan-like in nature. Perhaps mindful of the folly of their South Yorkshire neighbours, however, Armstrong's club Sheffield Wednesday will not allow him to play when they visit Blundell Park a week on Saturday.
The grand old Brian Laws, he had eleven men, he marched them up to Division Two and he marched them down again. And when they were up they were up, and when they were down they were down, and when they couldn't get back up again several years later he got the sack. Yep: it's the moment Town fans and Ivano Bonetti alike have been awaiting ever since Laws became Scunthorpe manager in 1997. Although Russ Wilcox has been appointed caretaker at Glanford Park, there happens to be another man not a million miles away with over two years' experience of management at a higher level, and Town fans who now feel a bit guilty about wanting Paul Groves sacked and find themselves concerned as to his current and future well-being may find their spirits raised by the sacking of Brian Laws - as, indeed, may Town fans who couldn't give a toss.
They say satire is dead, but then again they probably haven't been to a Dave Chambers gig. "Have you put Humberside Police in charge of the Diary's archives?" writes Dave. "You seem to be missing some days at the start of this month." Spotter's badge to Mr C. The blame for this appalling turn of events is currently the subject of heated debate and bun-throwing among the Cod Almighty team, with Simon Wilson's finger pointing at the absolutely rubbish new server the site has recently moved to and Mark Stilton insisting (probably because he said the new server would be OK) that the key factor is actually human error - or more precisely the gross stupidity of his colleagues. In the meantime, if anyone has a copy of the missing days cached on their hard drive, we'd be awfully grateful... but at least we now know how it feels to be abducted by aliens.