Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 29 April 2008

29 April 2008

First up today, cast your cares away, forget all the gloom of 16th place, and let a smile light up your face, for the Town are going up! A one-nil win over Winterton Rangers on Sunday has secured promotion for GTFC's women's team, reports the club's superb new official website on what seems to have been a tense top-of-the-table affair, the winning goal being scored by midfielder Charlotte Goodwin with 15 minutes left to play. A decent crowd of 200 turned out at Blundell Park for the match, adds the SNOS, which the Diary will be keeping an eye on in the hope of more coverage of GTLFC in the future, or at the very least of finding out which division the Mariners' women will be playing in next season now that they've climbed out of the Lincolnshire County Women's League.

A step back in time now, albeit not that far, as Town's latest mention in the media outside North East Lincolnshire comes in the Liverpool Daily Post and an interview with Danny Coyne. The Tranmere keeper enjoyed a couple of good seasons for the Mariners in the early part of this decade, of course, as our fishy heroes clung on for dear life to second-flight status - a time he harks back to with a fondness that is barely perceptible. "The statistics for one season at Grimsby said I was making about eight saves in every game," says the player. "Looking back, that might have been an average right the way through. We stayed in the Championship - so it was success as far as we were concerned." Not the fans though, Danny, who could be found on a daily basis filling messageboards with bile as they bitterly bemoaned Peter Furneaux's lack of ambition, accusing the then chairman of being content merely to preserve the club's second-flight status. It's like one of those Aesop's fables, except with Willie Falconer instead of a tortoise.

Continuing to see ourselves as others see us, let's have a quick look at Peterbororough's Evening Telegraph and its account of the Posh thumping GTFC at the weekend. On the debit side, it is unnecessarily cruel to point out that "Posh teased, toyed with and ultimately tortured a Grimsby side who looked bemused and befuddled long before the end", but the Diary admires the chutzpah of the reporter's claim that Peterborough are the fourth division's moral champions this season because their football is so much slicker and easier on the eye than the more direct fare served up by Bastard Franchise Scum. It's just like Town being moral winners of the Dulux Cup on account of being the last legitimate football club left in the tournament.

Staying with Peterborough for the final item of today's Diary, we have an email from an anonymous Posh fan who writes: "I have been an avid reader of Tony Butcher's literary masterpieces for a couple of years and logged on with great anticipation to read his description of Saturday's match only to find he was indisposed. I would like to wish him a speedy recovery and look forward to next year's offerings describing your promotion from the footballing abyss. All the best." Thanks, anonymous Posh fan! The Diary has been relieved to learn that Tony B is on the mend, albeit not as quickly as we would have hoped, but hopefully he'll be fit to bow out for the season with a masterpiece of taking the positives from Town's limp 3-1 defeat at Hereford this weekend!