Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Friday 10 September 2010

10 September 2010

Look, does anyone know a decent boozer within a mile of Tamworth's ground that serves drinkable real ale and edible food? Your Guest Diarist will need sustenance tomorrow. At least then if Town put in one of their unreliable Rushden-type performances I can endure it just ever-so-slightly tiddly, and with a full stomach. What can we expect? Youth - Tamworth are a young team. Size. They are bound to be huge. Every team is massive in this division. Confident? Well, they beat all the fancied teams they come up against. It's a result I find totally impossible to predict, but I've never been to the capital of Mercia and here's a chance to put that right.

Earlier diarists have neglected to tell you, gentle reader, about the Town yoof's amazing 11-0 drubbing of the hapless lads from Market Deeping. Sam Mulready got five while Charlie I'Anson and Dayle Southwell each scored two with Jack Bradbury and Kieron Smith making up the rest. This was an FA Youth Cup qualifying game and the folk from south Lincolnshire got a tough draw eh? Still, a clinical demolition was asked for by hobbly ex-right-back Stockdale and duly provided by our lads.

Despite selling Ryan Bennett and the young lad Barlow for the best part of six hundred grand, Town still lost money last season to the tune of £40,000. The wage bill went up a bit, not down; the fans chipped in as much revenue as they normally do (bless them) and the TV money was over six hundred grand. Despite this, if you take the windfall transfers out, the loss was over half a million quid. This season we'll be lucky to get ten bob and a bag of spanners from the start-up TV company, so the financial outlook looks grim to me.

The only good news is that Messrs Fenty and Parker have each converted part of their loans to the club in to shares. The end result is that the pair will each own half a million quid's worth of shares (39.6 per cent each), thus strengthening the balance sheet a bit and stifling the mutterings from fans like me who complained they had the plc over a barrel. But again, in a letter from Fenty to shareholders, he is asking all the smaller shareholders to sign over all decision-making to them and also asking shareholders to waive their legal right to have their shares compulsorily acquired if the main shareholders (quaintly known as the 'concert party' in the wonderfully arcane language of the law) reach 90 per cent ownership. Maybe we can't live with them, but Town are miles off being able to survive without them, so I suppose we have to shrug and carry on.

Moore and Woodses have both been telling Mariners Player that various squad members are feeling a bit better. Atkinson is back in training but needs to get fit; Charles (don't call him Charlie) has had a minor knee operation while he is out with a knackered hamstring; Coulson is disguising his limp so he can play for England C next week (so may even figure tomorrow); and Kenny Arthur is "pain-free". But Woodses is tempted to stick with his winning team (how many Town managers have uttered those words in the last five seasons?). So I expect Coulson to be a substitute. Michael Leary, who turned out for the reserves the other night, looked rough, apparently so won't figure.

Thrusting young heterosexual Peter Bore has taken his turn to be interviewed by the Telegraph for the column inches normally reserved for players to explain we've-been-a-bit-shit-lately but-we-are-bound-to-improve-tomorrow. Mr Bore introduces the piece with the announcement that he is playing the best football of his life and ends it by saying: "I personally think we can win every game this month because confidence is high. We started the month with a win and hopefully it will continue tomorrow." Thus, putting the mockers on any chance of us coming away with three points.

Finally the redoubtable Anthony Wood has been on, noting that not only has Town's match at Forest Green been moved to a bloody Thursday night because of the telly, but also the following match at Kidderminster will now take place on a flipping Sunday (10 October). So if you've already bought a non-refundable rail ticket - tough. Never mind, that afternoon they are showing Fleetwood versus Cambridge. Just what the doctor ordered, eh? See yer.