Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 4 April 2006

4 April 2006

The Mariners will have to play this Saturday's 5-0 defeat in Cumbria without the services of Gary Cohen, whose removal from last weekend's win over Wrexham has been confirmed as owing to damaged knee ligaments. According to the club's official website, Cohen, who has been something of an unsung hero for the Mariners in the second half of this season, is "almost certain to miss" the visit to Carlisle Five as a result of the injury, and, hang on, knee ligaments, that means he'll probably be out for flipping ages, doesn't it? The news confers added significance upon Marc 'The Refrigerator' Goodfellow's excellent (first-half) performance against Wrexham and probably spells a return to the starting line-up for Andy 'The Two-Handled Saucepan' Parkinson. Curtis Woodhouse is "still struggling with a hip problem", meanwhile; maybe he should listen to some Hot Chip on a customised iPod.

Following the accidental recent success of Town's Target 6000 campaign (one strongly suspects that without the April Fool promotion, the game against Wrexham might have been attended by 7,000 supporters), the club's next home game has been granted 'kid for a quid' status. The Grimsby Telegraph (naturally) reports that the younglings will be admitted for just one hundred pence to the Mariners' 15 April meeting with Shrewsbury, and there'll be a jolly Easter game for them involving 250 chocolate eggs hidden around Blundell Park - an activity that would clearly not have gone to plan had Tony Crane remained at the club.

Local seafood merchant Fraser Seafoods has bought a gigantic halibut weighing more than 350 pounds - or, to put it another way, even more than Tony Crane. The monster fish was caught and landed by a Norwegian trawler and sold to the Grimsby-based company, which now plans to process and sell pieces of the beast to caterers up and down the country - unless, of course, Russell Slade plays it in the centre of defence this weekend.

Rutland Arms regulars and long-time buddies Dave the (Quality) Engineer and Sibbo have both emailed the Diary on the same subject. "How did the dead ball specialist known as Newey contrive to win the man of the match award v Wrexham?" asks Dave. "As usual, their winger/attacker-type person had acres of space to control the ball and pass it infield, and when the so-called left-back attacked, the ball ended up dead. Confused? So am I. Thank goodness for the Lump." Sibbo concurs with the Cod Almighty verdict that the real MoM last Saturday was the magnificent Paul Bolland, adding: "Our engine room doesn't get enough recognition. Is that anything to do with va-va-voom, do you think?" Not sure, mate, but Arsenal would surely have run the Premiership's top three a lot closer had they chosen Bolland to replace Patrick Vieira - and, for that matter, paired Thierry Henry with the Lump up front. Their loss is our gain.