Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Monday 2 January 2006

2 January 2006

The Mariners begin 2006 much as they ended 2005: placed second in the fourth division league table despite today's eighth home defeat of the season at the hands of Carlisle, who come back from an early Ciaran Toner goal with two badly defended strikes by Zigor Aranalde. Despite a Tom Newey penalty miss that is as surprising as Chelsea's 14-point lead in the FA Barclaycard Cash Dosh Lucre Spondoolicks Money Money Money Premiership, Town battle back gamely in the last 10 or 15 minutes, hitting the post and bar, but the three points scarcely flatter an impressive Carlisle side. The Cumbrians remain fourth, just two points behind GTFC; third-placed Leyton Orient pull level with Town having played a game more, as have Cadbury's Flake Wycombe, who stay top despite a spectacular 5-4 home defeat against Macclesfield, of all people.

Other points of interest for black and whiteys as the calendar, er, gets thrown away and replaced by a new one include the re-signing of former Mariner Matt Bloomer on a one-month loan from Lincoln in response to Saturday's defender carnage at Wrexham, where Rob Jones, Simon Ramsden and Gary Croft all joined Justin Whittle and Sir John McDermott on the great big injured defender list. Bloomer made his second debut for Town this afternoon playing at right-back. Well, Tony Crane was never going to get a game - bound, as he seemingly is, for Worksop Town. Sad, isn't it.

Tomorrow the Diary will go over some of the emails you sent over the Christmas and new year period, which I forgot to go over at the time. Tonight I will end by wishing you all every happiness for the new year. More happiness than the Town fan who said to his mate, while coming out of today's match: "That Reddy's just a donkey." And more happiness than Andrew, who phoned Radio Humberside afterwards to bemoan the apparently poor quality of the players Town will apparently sign to replace Michael Reddy and all the other players they're apparently going to sell this month. No, of course he hadn't been to the game. Cheer up, you miserable bastards!