Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 16 August 2005

16 August 2005

Russell Slade is considering a change to his forward line this weekend after Nick 'Only One G This Week' Hegarty scored both goals in Town reserves' 3-2 home defeat by Darlington yesterday afternoon, reports the club's official website. But after last week's Reddy-injury-feigning mind games suckered Bristol Rovers into fielding the slowest defenders they could find and thus handing GTFC the points on a finely crafted porcelain plate, the crafty Mariners maestro seems to be resisting the obvious urge to tell the world that Ginger Nick will play this Saturday, slyly suggesting instead that Gary Cohen will be the man promoted to a first-team start. "He caused them a lot of problems and he had a hand in Hegarty's goals," said Slade, winking conspicuously.

Other news to emerge from yesterday's run-out for the stiffs includes the non-impression made by trialists Stuart Edwards and Kyle Armstrong and the emergence, unscathed, of Ciaran Toner after 70 minutes of high-intensity second-string action. So excited is Town's Northern Ireland international, you know, by his successful workout in the reserves and the possibility of a first-team place this weekend that Toner has given an interview to the Grimsby Telegraph, which paraphrases fairly accurately as: "I'm excited by my successful workout in the reserves and the possibility of a first-team place this weekend." Which is good news for you, because I've saved you reading it, though possibly less good for the Telegraph's online advertising sales department, who will now lose 12.8 million hits on the page and be out of a job by the weekend and homeless by Christmas. Still, not my problem.

Toner's return to fitness is also good news for Town fans because it delays still further the day on which they must come to a final decision on how to pronounce the surname of Terry Barwick. The deadline extension comes at an opportune moment, given the recent stalling of ceasefire negotiations between the phonetic majority and a militant band of 'Barrick' rebels who had threatened to blockade the entrance to the John Smiths stand and erect an illegal statue of the former Tottenham, QPR and England defender and silent-W spiritual leader Terry Fenwick.