Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Wednesday 20 July 2005

20 July 2005

Two and a bit weeks before the season begins, Town's murky goalkeeping situation shows no signs of clarification, as today's Grimsby Telegraph leads with the news that Steve Mildenhall may, or may not, be fit for the opening game against Oxford on 6 August and that his chances of being so may, or may not, depend upon him sitting out the rest of the club's pre-season friendlies, which he may, or may not, do. In a rare instance of the Telegraph giving a more optimistic angle than the club's, Trevor Green's piece begins by asserting that Mildenhall "should be fit" in time, only to quote a rather more cautious Mr Russell Slade declaring himself "hopeful" that the player's knee/ankle combo knack will have cleared up in time for the not-so-big kick-off a fortnight on Saturday. John Lukic is believed to be hiding in a box somewhere.

Big Steve's fellow injury victim Simon Ramsden, meanwhile, is making a concerted bid for Alan Pouton permacrock status with a strained arse in July. The same Telegraph piece informs us that the ball-playing centre-half is receiving treatment from Town's physio Dave Moore, which must be quite embarrassing for them both, and Miles Moss has emailed the Diary in response to a contribution yesterday about, er, Rambo's unlikely bum trouble. "John Pakey almost hit the nail on the head in linking Ramsden and Bonetti's injuries," he writes. "The difference is, of course, that Bonetti was injured by an arse."

Like a gullible young university lecturer asked for another extension by a malingering but highly attractive student, Town have moved back the deadline for discounted season tickets again, and fans now have until the end of July to sign away nine months of their lives to despair at a cheaper price. The reason given for this is the interest created by the club's recent signing of a Congo international, who now seems to be called Jean-Paul Kamudimba Kalala. Clearly the BP bean-counters have calculated that the club's financial worries will soon be over if they go on acquiring new season ticket holders at the same rate their players are acquiring new names.