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Diary - Tuesday 8 August 2006

8 August 2006

"The club tends to be incapable of stating its own case in intelligible English" - The Diary, 7 August 2006

"Other media partners subscribe to GTFC overheads by paying a sponsorship fee for rights of access, advertising and notice of points of interest" - Grimsby Town Football Club, 8 August 2006

With the playing squad remaining three or four names short of a picnic, the Mariners' row with Radio Humberside reaches the top of today's news agenda as the club attempts to justify itself in characteristically cack-handed prose. GTFC bosses have declared grandly that the club will not be "bullied into accepting a derisory offer" by the Beeb; indeed, they are so pleased with this phrase that they use it on two occasions, even managing to spell "accepting" correctly on one of them. Needless to say, the reader is none the wiser by the end of the piece, and the only information that might enable us to see the situation in a useful context - namely the fees paid by BBC local radio to fourth division clubs elsewhere in England - is again conspicuous by its absence. Still, why bother explaining yourself properly to your supporters and attempting to resolve disagreements with the media in a calm and mature fashion when it's so much easier to just chuck a playschool tantrum and alienate the lot of them?

But Mr Diary, whispers the devil on my shoulder, surely you are indulging here in precisely the kind of ill-balanced, shit-stirring coverage for which you have previously criticised other media. Shut up, devil on my shoulder, responds the Diary, because I have an email here that will prove you wrong, and besides, you haven't cleaned your teeth. "Until reading your piece today I had no strong opinions about the spat between Radio Hullberside and GTFC," writes Phil Watson. "However, I now side with 'the board of Grimsby Town for refusing to pay the decreased fees' for coverage of the club's games. What an outrage that the BBC should expect the club to pay for its matches to be covered! Thank goodness we have CA to state the club's case 'in intelligible English' and all without a misplaced apostrophe." Cheque's in the post, Phil - a small price for a clear conscience. Should anyone from the club be reading today's Diary, please email to discuss my fee.

With all this nonsense dominating the virtual back pages, anyone would think the Mariners weren't actually playing Wrexham tonight at all, and the fixture list published on Thursday 22 June were naught but a queer dream. I suppose it pretty much was naught but a queer dream after all the games that got moved to Fridays, actually, but that's by the by. This paragraph, at last, is about the team news for tonight, and GTFC have spared their opposition the anxiety of wondering whether Peter Bore would start the match by stating openly that Grahams Rodgerses will begin with the same sleepy XI that kicked off against Boston last Saturday. Unless it's all some sort of elaborate double-bluff thingy, but we don't know yet whether Grezza goes in for all that stuff. Ah, Peter Bore. Let's not place unreasonable expectations on the lad, but with him in the squad there's no way Town won't be promoted by Christmas, is there?

Since the Diary's invitation yesterday for readers to email with opinions about Town's proposed new stadium, literally Mark Wilson has done just that. "I beg to differ with the Diary's assertion that you won't be able to get a decent pint close to the new ground," he begins. "My brother-in-law lives but a short stagger from the proposed site of the Fentydome and he always has a decent selection of beers in the fridge or an oaky red uncorked. I won't have to pay for car parking either! Although he seems far less enthusiastic about the new ground than I am." Thank you for that, Mark. Presumably he'll be less enthusiastic still when you've passed on his address to the Cod Almighty editorial team.