Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Wednesday 31 August 2005

31 August 2005

Having recently hit on an extraordinary tactical innovation that could change the face of football as we know it, and fielded a team comprising four defenders, four midfielders and two forwards, Russell Slade has been conducting a last-minute search for players to fit his bold new system. The result is that Town have signed from Norwegian side Viking Stavanger a 20-year-old left-sided midfielder with the very un-Norwegian name of Tommy Taylor, who will appear for the Mariners' reserves this afternoon in a game against Sheffield United at Saltergate. Bizarre! Taylor's arrival will come as a disappointment to those who saw Slade's switch to 4-4-2 as a chance for Nick Hegarty to replace the underperforming Tom Newey on the left of midfield, or indeed for the many supporters who wished to see Calvin Andrew's loan extended after an impressive bank holiday from the Luton forward, but is sure to delight lovers of the unexpected, as the transfer could scarcely have been more surprising had Russ conducted it wearing fluorescent yellow braces and playing 'Urban Spaceman' on an afro-latin tongue drum.

GTFC have put in place a frankly terrifying system to ensure not only that season ticket holders get first dibs on tickets for the forthcoming League Cup tie against Tottenham, but that ticket stub holders and supporters' trust members get second dibs and the bloke at work who hasn't been to BP since 1984 and thought Clive Mendonca was rubbish has a seat with a restricted view and rainwater dripping down the back of his shirt. "Don't panic" is the message coming out of the club, but panic is very much the Diary's initial reaction upon being confronted with an impenetrably epic timetable of ticket availability that could shame the cryptic crossword in the Independent. Or rather it would be if I weren't already guaranteed a ticket simply on account of being so cool.

Former Town keeper Paul Crichton is perhaps remembered for blemishing the otherwise spotless record of Paul Futcher by attempting to kick out, and spectacularly missing, a back-pass from the legendary defender one balmy afternoon at Nottingham Forest in the early 1990s, handing the home side their second goal in a 5-3 defeat for the Mariners. The Yorkshire-born gloveman went on to tot up 150 appearances for the side before a £250,000 follow-Buckley move to West Brom, an unlikely loan to Aston Villa, and spells with Burnley and Norwich before dabbling with non-League football at York, Accrington and Leigh RMI. Why am I telling you this? Because Kryters is back in the big time after signing a two-year deal as a player-coach with third division Gillingham. Well, yeah. I mean it's all relative.

Cod Almighty's very own Mark Stilton has very kindly emailed the Diary to put me right about the last time Town played live on the telly. "I think the last Town match on Sky was probably the 2-2 draw at Forest on my birthday (10 March) in 2003," writes the cheesily monikered CA letters editor. "Groves scored a great goal - or rather, the build-up was superb. I think he started the move in our half before suddenly appearing in the box to finish off a lovely bit of passing football. Forest got a jammy equaliser in the 90th minute." Indeed, Mark, and the fact that the Diary of 11 March 2003 describes the goal in question as finishing "a fantastic move of many passes like that cool one Brazil did in the 1970 World Cup" makes it all the less forgivable for me to have overlooked the match yesterday. On the other hand, my thinking the Mariners' last live televised appearance was that Blackburn game really helped to pad out what would have been an otherwise drably functional paragraph - so what the fuck, eh.

Today's final word goes to Guest Diary (who I hope will be able to resume his regular Friday slot on this page when he gets his new house in order). "Don't you wake up some mornings thinking what a fantastically shit hot day to wear your Macca T-shirt?" is the entire extent of GD's email. And no further words are needed, except: "yes" and "in fact, I put mine on to go down the pub on Monday night after I got back from the match".