Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Thursday 3 November 2011

3 November 2011

In the time that Grimsby Town chief executive and acting boss of the club Ian Fleming took to tell Dale Ladson and the Mariners Player subscribers that there was nothing to really worry about, and that he remained as optimistic as ever, the club lost about a tenner. For every minute of every day, Grimsby Town are losing about £1.98, your Guest Diarist's Google calculator has revealed.

And in breaking news, Radio Humberside has announced that the club's bid for a £5m grant to part-finance a 'community stadium' has failed. Probably because it was desperately scribbled on the back of a John Fenty 'vote for me' election leaflet in about half an hour flat and contained too many vague promises. Like where the phrase 'community-owned' is used with its proper definition (please, please give us the cash) and with a between-the-lines alternative capitalist one (don't forget that it's the shareholders who own this club).

So Fenty, via an anonymous scrawled epilogue to the club's accounts containing the 'big new plan', has jumped the gun again, it would seem. Let's forget all those horrible big numbers with brackets round them; let's pretend a community stadium will pop up out of nowhere in no time flat and welcome the returning hordes of GTFC fans who will gaily wave their newly bought scarves from the glistening new club shop, clutching equally shiny season tickets. You remember when the screen went a bit whirly and we were let inside the mind of Alan Partridge's deepest fantasies for ten seconds or so? You get the feeling that the mind of the ex-chairman (soon to be re-elected, I suppose) is akin to that. Well, I do anyway. Possibly without the sweater, but it definitely contains a shiny, glittery Fentydome.

Fleming, in a terse, nervous Q&A with the camera, said nothing new. He clings to the idea of normality despite his tacit admission that the club is no longer a going concern and technically and practically insolvent. Because no money is overdue to HMRC for taxes or VAT, he truckles, no-one will apply for administration. Even without a sugar daddy the club is safe, he implies. Like when we made recently contracted players available for loan a few weeks ago, there have been zero expressions of interest from external investors (although 17 fans have pledged future lottery winnings to the club).

But what about the bank? Town's bankers have tired of reading truly awful trading reports year on year, tired of seeing the sharp decline in revenues without compensatory cost-cutting, and have insisted that the club's huge bank overdraft be scheduled in to a single five-year loan. Half a million quid to be paid back in five years. Miss two payments and the men in suits will undoubtedly descend with a winding-up order. No more overdraft: no room to manoeuvre. And the deckchairs on Town's Titanic remain in place, unshuffled: fiddles are playing, smoke is rising, icebergs are near! That distant howl is the call of the bank manager. Winter is coming.

Lincoln City, the club Fenty had the front to offer advice to last season, has more experience in these matters. They are one season behind Town in the non-League cycle, have seen attendances drop from 3,000 to 2,200 with consequent revenue falls and have announced yesterday drastic cost-cutting measures. Their chief executive Steve Prescott has said the club needs to behave like a non-League club and has asked for voluntary redundancies from the 20 full-time staff as part of a general review of the club's finances.

Yeah, that's right, gentle reader, 20. The Town accounts report 53 full-time staff last season (down from 56). Wake up Mr Fleming - you are dream-walking the club to insolvency. Stop listening to Fenty's deluded ravings, earn your salary and take some tough financial decisions. And fast. See yer.