Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Friday 16 December 2005

16 December 2005

On a day when your Guest Diarist has to get his skates on due to a weird and unexpected job coming up, my sympathies go out to those poor sods at Northwich Victoria who have been well and truly stitched up by those fat black cats at Sunderland, aided and abetted by those complete twazzocks who constitute the FA. Having fought their way in to the third round and got an away draw to a 'big club', Northwich then discover that Sunderland wanted to charge a measly £6 for adults and £1 for the kids to ensure a big crowd. The FA mediated and the tickets will now be a still very paltry £10 and £5. This will deprive the non-Leaguers of the best of two hundred grand, according to their chairman, Mike Connett. This just a few months after Northwich got themselves out of queer street. I tell you what, gentle reader, the FA Cup is not what it was. Not what it was, I say.

This is being written too early for any team news as Town prepare to face Darlo away tomorrow, but the likelihood is that the same team that so disappointed the home crowd last Saturday will be told to pull up their stockings and get on with it. No-one had a complete stinker, mind, but everyone was just, well, collectively crap, weren't they?

And none more so than Mr Slade, who has been justifiably bollocked by everyone I know for his ill-thought-out temper tantrum at the Telegraph, which the Diary told you about on Tuesday. The club issued a statement yesterday complaining that the Grimsby Telegraph article "does not properly reflect Russell Slade's feelings". It seems much more likely, on this occasion, that the problem lies with the manager's defensive outburst rather than the actual reporting. We all say daft things in the heat of the moment, but not everyone is big enough to admit it afterwards. And that is what our Russell should have done, via a personal apology to put his earlier remarks into proper context.

Just recognise, Mr Slade, that home goals are almost as important an ingredient in attendances as league position, to the wavering Town fans who need to be enticed back to Blundell Park. Despite the fact that it is up for sale, the Telegraph will be around for a long time, and picking stupid fights like this one will get you nowhere, matey. So let's hope we put a few away in the next home game against Lincoln to put this sorry story to bed. It's all right, I suppose, all this bouncing back, but you just get a bit tired of it after a while...

So I'll have to love you and leave you now as I am required to morph into Ted from The Fast Show and rake leaves up at the big house this afternoon. Then give the master's Bentley a run. So it's a forelock-tugging "see yer, folks".