Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Monday 28 July 2008

28 July 2008

"Let's put things into perspective. The manager sets the team up experimentally with what he has available and mixes and matches it. If he was looking just to win, he would pick this strongest team every time which is not what pre-season is all about." So goes the latest response from the chairma as Town fans bury their faces in their hands after the 3-0 defeat at Farsley Celtic on Friday night. Councillor Fenty must get up at 4am, pour some strong cup into his Boss mug, and sit at his computer in his cruds as he scours Town related messageboards, just so he has his finger on the pulse and can put us right.

As perspective goes, Mr Fenty hasn't exactly got a parallax view. The manager's 'strongest' team, pretty much a first choice XI, lost out to a club two divisions down the ladder, due to failings in defence (slack marking) and midfield (no cover). If fitness and strength are factors, our boys need more Red Bull - a lot more - so knackered were they by the second half of their fourth game in six days. For whatever reason Fenty draws reference to Hull's defeat at Winterton last summer, and how they put this setback (ahem) aside to gain promotion to the Premiership. Worth noting that the Tigers finished off their pre-season by beating Town and Newcastle, and drawing against two teams - Doncaster and Stockport - that also gained promotion.

The overall performances in pre-season games do give an indication of the coming season, and decent performances and results buoy both the players and fans. That "season tickets are under budget" is not a revelation to regular readers here, but the chairman admits after so much tub-thumping it's 'worrying'.

Immediately after the game Idle Diary's brief exchange with Peter Furneaux about the match amounted to little more than "it's not good is it?" from the ex-chairman. While it's not all doom and gloom, at the moment you have to agree: it's not good is it? Not rose coloured spectacles, just how it is.