Cod Almighty | Diary
Diary - Thursday 20 May 2010
20 May 2010
Armchair Diary writes: There's nothing going on in the world, at least not the world of Grimsby Town Football Club, and I have to go out soon so don't expect top quality journalism from me today.
Yes, dear reader, I am back after missing the last couple of weeks. I gave up my regular Thursday gig to go on holiday. Rhodes, in case you were wondering. And if you're still wondering, it was dead nice and I had a really good time, thank you. Admittedly it could have been timed a little better as I was out the country when the inevitable happened so only found out in the early hours of last Sunday morning that we'd been relegated, a full week after the event. On the bright side I managed to avoid all the media coverage of the pitch invasions so didn't feel embarrassed to support Town like I'm sure many of you did at the time.
Yesterday there was no explanation as to why John Deehan left the club. Today, there is. His contract expired, simple as that, it seems. However, Deehan is still talking to the Telewag and reckons the club are right to stick with Neil Woodses. I don't blame the Telewag for the confusion in this article as I'm sure the noises coming out of the Blundell Park building were just as puzzling. Deehan was brought is as head of recruitment to add his experience to the coaching team and had an input into training but his main role was scouting. Eh? What? I am just a naive fan but to me scouting means being out on the road, watching other players, making contacts and networking. You're away from base looking for players that could benefit the club. Coaching, in my books, means helping out with training on a day to day basis, passing on your expertise to the players to help them improve their performance and become better footballers. Scouts are on the road, coaches are at home.
So was Deehan only at training every now and then and spent most of his time on the road checking out other players and thus mainly a scout, as Woodses suggests? Or was he scouting from the BP/Cheapside area, perhaps just by playing the latest version of Championship Manager to see which players come good, and was thus able to have more input into training? Either way, it doesn't really matter now as he's gone. According to the gaffer we have a "big scouting network" anyway so don't need Deehan. So here's a challenge for you: name any of the scouts employed by Grimsby Town Football Club. Emails can be sent to the usual address or you can use the feedback form to show us how much you know about the inner workings of the club.
Hated local rivals, Scunthorpe United, booooooooooooooooooooooooo, will be the Mariners' opponents if we manage to get past Lincoln City in the Lincolnshire Senior Cup, or the Lincolnshire Football Association Ltd Senior County Cup Competition to give it its full title (and pad this Diary out to a more respectable length), as Scunny have been given a bye to the final. Not sure why, but then I have never really understood this competition. Oh, right. According to Wikipedia it seems that as there are just three Football League sides, two of them play a semi-final with the winners going on to play the other side. With Scunny being the holders it seems reasonable that they get a bye to the final. But why are Town playing in the semi-final when "teams in levels 5-8 [Conference and the numerous regional divisions below that] compete for the Lincolnshire Senior Shield"? Why aren't we playing for the Shield instead of the Cup? That's a serious question, y'know. I want to know the answer and I'm not writing another word until someone explains why the Lincs Senior Cup isn't now a straight fight between Lincoln and Scunthorpe.