Cod Almighty | Diary

Diary - Tuesday 3 July 2012

3 July 2012

He said it wouldn't happen again. Not after what happened with Matt Heywood, Paul Linwood, Danny North, Nick Hegarty, Lewis Gobern, Nick Colgan, Steven Watt and, perhaps most notoriously, Lewis Gobern. Deadly John (Hotdog) promised us the huge deficit run up under his leadership would no longer be inflated by contract severance fees. Every time John's sharp business mind told him to sack a manager, it just got harder to find a credible replacement without promising ££££s to build a new squad from scratch.

So after Shorty and Shouty came in, there was just the small matter of Charles Ademeno, Dwayne Samuels, Lee Ridley, Darran Kempson, Rob Eagle and Damian Spencer to pack off down the A180 with a large sack of cash. Oh, and now - at last - Serge Makofo.

Back in the Football League, Town fans watched the likes of Peter Sweeney and Barry Fucking Conlon take the piss out of us. And your original/regular Diary was one of many who said: "I wouldn't so much mind us having crap players, as long as they were making an honest effort." Then we dropped out of the league and Neil Woodses signed Serge Makofo from Kettering Town. Never the world's most capable player, Makofo's attitude meant he could hardly be accused of the same kind of shrugging, payslip football served up by Sweeney and Conlon. But the fans decided they didn't want him anyway. Poor Serge Makofo. Watch him score against us for Gainsborough in 11 days' time.

Michael Rushby has emailed to further our discussions of great terrace witticisms, with "another gem from the old Barrett Stand". And a real gem it is - thanks, Michael. Today's diary will play out with it. In the meantime, if you'd like to chip in with a great terrace witticism from your own memory, email diary@codalmighty.com or hit our Facebook. So long, and over to Michael...

"In the late 1950s, footballers were set to go on strike against the principle of the maximum wage (which I think was £17 per week). Older folks might remember the TV football presenter Jimmy Hill, who was the chairman of the PFA at that time. Following his victorious threat-to-strike campaign, Fulham then paid Johnny Haynes the astronomical sum of 5,000 pounds per YEAR.

"Anyway, the point of the story is that Grimsby Town had a home match ahead of the proposed date of the strike. Great player that he was, Jimmy Fell was subject to the odd aberration and in this case, within a matter of minutes, he twice managed to miscontrol a sweeping left-wing pass, thus conceding a throw to the opposition on the halfway line. On the second occasion, the booming voice from the back of the stand bellowed: "The fucking strike's next week, Jim".