Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 25 November 2008

25 November 2008

Whether it's because he chooses to go back to Ipswich and fight for a place in the first team, or because Mike Newell decides to look elsewhere for reinforcements, Liam Trotter looks likely to play his final game for the Mariners at Macclesfield tonight. "I'm so happy to be here and to be playing. It means a lot to me," said the Ipswich loanee last Wednesday, only to talk of a return to Portman Road two days later as Town prepared for their bottom-of-the-table meeting with Bournemouth. Today Mr Re-Newell seems to have taken matters into his own hands by telling the Grimsby Telegraph that a hypothetical new loanee signed for a month from Thursday would be eligible for five games, whereas a third month at Blundell Park for Trotter would span only three because of the Mariners' early FA Cup exit. The really vital piece of information that Town fans will be looking for in the run-up to tonight's match, though, is that Martin Gritton is a best-priced 7/1 with Blue Square and 888 Sport to open the scoring - marginally better value than the 15/2 available from Bet 365 on Martin Butler.

"That wretched Gloryhunter project had remained off my radar until I read today's Diary," wrote Pete Brooksbank in an email to the Diary yesterday afternoon. "Navigating to his blog on the ITV site, I immediately spotted the problem. This is a man who boasts of paying £35 to 'co-own' Ebbsfleet (he owns nothing) while shuddering at the thought of dropping down to the 'Blue Square Northern League' (there is no such league). He's Tim Lovejoy's bastard lovechild, isn't he? Both insufferably patronising and woefully ignorant. I confidentially predict Gloryhunter will be supplying witless banter with thicko players and dullard pub bands like The Pigeon Detectives on Soccer AM before the end of the decade." Well said, that man - the Gloryhunter has a little way to go before he matches the telling "League Three" howler in Lovejoy's autobiography, but it's only a little way.