Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Friday 24 December 2010

24 December 2010

Here we are then, Christmas Eve and the world is frozen solid. Your Guest Diarist has just been down to the allotments to observe four old codgers trying to get parsnips out of the ground. I left when the pickaxe routine failed comically. Of course, the Boxing Day game at Mansfield has been called off too. If you can't get a pickaxe into the ground you certainly can't get a stud in. And to make matters worse the Mansfield toilets are a no-go area due to a whole series of burst pipes. As for Tuesday's home game, the mood is despondent ahead of Monday's pitch inspection.

Manager Woodses succumbed to the normal pre-match-postponed interview like Gordon Ramsey filming his family Christmas lunch with the leaves still on the trees. A pointless contractual obligation for a TV audience trying to feel festive by proxy. Ho, ho, ho, everyone's fit bar Watts; the tackles are flying in from Bradley Woods and "the quality and attitude are ten times what they were this time last season." Speaking of quality, as Woods did when mentioning how difficult it is to attract League players to a non-League club, brings me to Arsene Wenger, who has had words on an allied subject this week.

Now the Diary doesn't quote top premiershite managers too often. Unlike all too many lower-league fans, us lot at Cod Almighty don't 'follow' a top team as well as supporting Town. Myself, there's room in my heart for family, for friends, my favourite musicians and for Town and not a lot else. But what Wenger said (in the context of young players being rubbish for England U21 if they've had a taste at full international level) struck a chord: "When a player plays under his normal real level he is never good. When you put a player down two divisions, you would be disappointed by him because it is a low mental key, and, for him, he has to adapt to a different game, and he will be lost."

You can put arguments for and against when better-class loanees have turned out for Town. Beasant was awesome, as was, all too briefly, Pringle, and Andy Todd was ace some of the time. But I remember thinking that Richard Hughes didn't look any way near premiershite quality and that Dean Sinclair didn't exactly tear any trees up in his first loan spell. And that brings me to Andrew Wright. Wright was neat and tidy; he didn't make a lot of mistakes; but he didn't sparkle did he? John Oster, with a home-town point to prove of course, was, to use the modern vernacular, a different-class legendy loanee. This discussion is going nowhere isn't it? But I still say that the best players Town can sign in our present situation would come from our own division. Players who are used to the Conference and who see a move to Town as a step up, not down.

Anyway, we've had Matt Pakes on shouting about our festive splash screen: "Get Jarmo off that image, you bastards." Well Matt, it's a well-known fact that I said (more than once) that Jarman would just about scrape into my top ten favourite Town players. But he spoiled everything at the end didn't he? As the journos say, the manner of his departure was a real disappointment. So that's why he's there.

So how about an impromptu competition to name all the people on that screen? The first all-correct answer received will get a famous Cod Almighty T-shirt. So send your entry in with your address and size. What the winner gets, frankly, depends on what size you are. We'll try to avoid sending you a Newell one though.

So have a happy, safe Christmas, gentle reader and we'll be back next week with news of more postponements. See yer.