Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Monday 28 February 2011

28 February 2011

Mardy Diary writes: With news of a board meeting this morning we may follow up today's diary with an update. If there's no news until late, I'm sure Idle Diary will pick it up tomorrow.

Until then the speculation continues to mount with the names Cooper, Foyle and Brabin being joined by the name of practically every other football manager across the country. I don't have a clue who it's likely to be, and largely I don't care. We can all get excited about a new manager, can't we? And we can all have our hopes ruined when we realise it's just the same old shit over and over again.

A little cynical perhaps, but I've been a season ticket holder for ten years now and it's just so... very... tiring. My own personal Groundhog Day, without Bill Murray there to cheer me up. My mood hasn't been lightened by Fenty's appearance on Radio Humberside, either. Whatever has happened between Fenty and Burns in the past is not relevant to the current situation, so to go on radio and act like a stroppy teen is embarrassing. And whatever your views on Dave Burns, it's not as if he's bloody Paxman, is it? Credit to him for asking the questions, but he didn't really push that hard. Fenty spoke in tongues, and when asked to expand or explain what he meant, he was largely recalcitrant. But Burns didn't keep pushing and pushing - he asked a couple of times then backed off like a nervous rabbit poking a vicious dog with a sharp stick.

So we leave the interview no clearer to what has happened, or what will happen. It was just more depressing, outdated 'management' speak. A garbled mess of hokey phraseology and cartoonish double-speak. Rafts. Mindsets. In the building. Oxygen tanks. Closing out. Conveyors of changes. Platforms. Going forward. What about the orange? I'll leave it with you, Dave.

It seems to me that Fenty's reputation, or what remains of it at least, is in utter ruin. Here then was an opportunity to go on local radio and admit the mistakes that had happened under his watch. To be open and honest, regretful and respectful - to show humility. Instead we got mardyness, defensiveness and sentences that meant nothing. We had accusations that the BBC were somehow trying to undermine Fenty by simply asking him about the money he has invested in the club. These 'benign' loans - but not so benign that they have been converted to equity. So then, isn't it OK that these sort of questions are asked? By fans, by journalists, by whoever? No-one is twisting words here - just asking straightforward questions. And Burns backed off anyway: how do you defend against that level of paranoia?

Even allowing for Fenty's usual idiosyncrasies, we were still left with a mess of an interview. This wasn't live, this was recorded - there was time for a measured response. Instead we get contradictions within the same sentence. So, Dave Moore's job isn't under threat, except we'll be appointing a new manager and assistant. So it is. We have stability as the watch word, and "we are not looking short-term this time either - we want to appoint the right man with a view to us getting promotion at the earliest opportunity". We have phrases such as: "Everything that is asked of you, you shouldn't always give." To what and whom, where, when? What is the context, John? Sure, I can interpret that to mean something - but I can also interpret that in any number of ways, most of which will be utterly wrong. Just say what you mean - there is nothing, NOTHING, to be gained here through being aloof.

Fenty has simply taken a terrible situation and made it a hundred times worse. Rather than waiting for the board to make the decision for him, perhaps it's time now to have one last stab at honour and make the decision himself.

They say that when the seagulls follow the trawler, it's because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea. But when the trawler is sinking, the seagulls just fuck off.