Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Wednesday 24 November 2010

24 November 2010

In the bad old days of football, the first division was called the first division, the European competition for league champions was contested by league champions, and professional footballers actually gave a fuck about playing professional football. Furthermore, once the transfer deadline had passed, you couldn't sign any more players that season. Now, of course, with globalised free market capitalism having brought so much joy to all our lives, the powers that be have applied the same model to football - with spectacular results.

Just look at the vastly improved numbers of footballers that supporters get to see these days. No longer bored with watching the same old players play for their teams year in year out, bound by outmoded concepts such as 'loyalty' and 'stability', fans can now thrill to the sight of 46 or 58 different footballers representing their club in a single season! These days, then, with players stepping into and out of football clubs like commuters on Tube trains, we need half a dozen transfer windows a year just to keep up with the hugely inflated number of transfers!

So if you miss a transfer deadline, don't worry - there'll be another one along in a minute. And Town's superb new official website is on hand to keep you and your original/regular Diary up to date with it all. Apparently Neil 'This Club Is Fucking Massive' Woods "has just two more days to wheel and deal in the loan transfer market" and "has not ruled out bolstering his squad". Of course, the reason Woods has not ruled out bolstering his squad may be that nobody has asked him about it either way, so he hasn't had a chance either to rule out or rule in bolstering his squad, and the whole reason the SNOS has mentioned it may be to get you to sign up for those official text messages that wake you up at 3am to tell you nothing has happened. But on the other hand, Robbie Fowler has just been seen in a hotel on Bargate.

Grrrr, Scunny! We warned them last week about being 25 miles away from us, and have they listened? No! They're still about 25 miles away from us! The rotters! Grrrr! Er, except when they're lending us decent players - like that Andrew Wright, whose arrival from Glanford Park on loan the other month did much to improve the Mariners' misfiring midfield.

But will Wright stay after his loan expires at the end of December? Nobody knows. And that includes the Scunthorpe Telegraph. With pages to fill and webspace to populate, though, the Telewag's kid brother publication isn't afraid to have a guess. "With [Plucky Irons] boss Ian Baraclough suggesting last week that he is not afraid to shake up his squad during January, the former Liverpool trainee is likely to be allowed to leave," reckons the ST. "I love being out there every week," says Wright, which is more than can be said for most of Town's supporters at the moment.

Oh, and there was a reserve game against King$ton Communication$ FC yesterday, by the way, which Town lost five-nil. Jamie Devitt scored four of them. Do you think the Hullies will notice if we sneak over the bridge and swap him with Lewis Gobern?