Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Thursday 12 January 2006

12 January 2006

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. A body set in motion will continue in motion unless acted on by an external force. The total amount of mass and energy in the universe remains constant. And the total height of the defenders in a football squad managed by Russell Slade will never fall below 8.5344 metres. Yes, folks - just as you were thinking the departure of Tony Crane was threatening to leave the Mariners with a damaging shortage of six-and-a-half-foot centre-backs, Sort It has put in his thumb and pulled out Ben 'Son of Paul' Futcher, the former Lincoln man who is second only to Rob Jones in the Football League's official table of freakishly gigantic defenders. The 24-year-old Goliath spent three years at Sincil Bank, scoring 17 times in 142 appearances, before leaving for Boston last summer, where he has struggled to fit in, possibly because of York Street's low ceilings; and in signing up until 2009 Futch Jnr becomes the first player to be awarded a GTFC contract for longer than two years since Crane himself arrived in 2003. Rumours are yet to be denied that if this season's promotion challenge falls flat, Town will apply for entry to the national basketball league.

In other transfer news, the Mariners' nouveau-riche neighbours Kingston Communications FC have upped their rate of signing strikers from one per week to one per day. In the past four and a half seasons, forwards brought in by the Tigers have included Lawrie Dudfield, Michael Reddy, Paul Tait, Caleb Folan, Neil Roberts, Kyle Lightbourne, Daniel Webb, Jamie Forrester, Ben Burgess, Danny Allsopp, Simon Johnson, Phil Jevons, Michael Branch, Jonathan Walters, Delroy Facey, Aaron Wilbraham, Craig Fagan, Steve McPhee, Chris Brown and Billy Paynter. You wouldn't expect them to get through a transfer window without adding one or two more to the list, then, and so this week's capture of Darryl Duffy from Falkirk has been followed up with a hyena-like scavenge for Jon Parkin of nouveau-poor Macclesfield. Isn't it amazing what white phone boxes can achieve.

Your working week with the regular Diary ends here, as Fridays on this page are customarily given over to CA's team of literate, perceptive and above all punctual guest diarists, but first of all we have another email about a certain McDonalds Cup tie last weekend. "My Newcastle-supporting mate tells me that the similarity between Saturday's win over Mansfield and the one over us was not lost on the Newcastle supporters," writes Mark Wilson, "but they have generally taken the view that 'at least Mansfield tried to play football against us, unlike that other lot who tried to kick us off the park'. I pointed out the difference in positions in the fourth division league table between Grimsby and Mansfield." Full marks to Mark, not only for making this important point but also for using the term "fourth division", as everyone should, because it makes another important point. MW concludes with an item of cheerful Tyneside blasphemy by asking: "Was 'Wor Jackie' a violent, moaning narcissus as well?" but tactfully stops short of calling Newcastle Brown Ale "a lasses' drink".