Cod Almighty | Match Stats

Saturday 20 March 2010

Division 4

Grimsby Town 3 Devitt (27), Coulson (61), Chambers (90+1)

Bournemouth 2 Bradbury (42), Feeney (62)

Attendance: 4428

And why not. It's lovely to see old-fashioned wingery.

It could be anyone. It could be Straight Peter Bore as usual, who surged beautifully. It could be The Big Rock Candy Mountain for being big. It could be Devitt for his devilry or Coulson for his conjuring trick. It will be Monsieur Ak de Ak for terrorising the cheerless Cherrymen with gallic rubberyness.

"The players showed what it meant to them. They never gave up from the first minute to the last and their resolve was rewarded... the response from the players to get one of their teammates out of trouble was terrific. Last week Nick Colgan kept us in the game and we dug him out this week. That's what squads do that have the right spirit."

"I don't think we played well at all the whole game. We got what we deserved. Grimsby were the better team; credit to them. Apart from our goalkeeper and two centre-halves we were poor."

Satisfyingly disappointing. They were just big blokes with a modicum of organisation. They biffed and clattered and didn't do much at all, relying on corners and free kicks for their moments of hope. They really didn't look interested in running around in the sogginess. They created perhaps two moments of danger in the whole game and never really looked like scoring. It took a doze and a doozy from us to let the ball go into our net. When the rain came they ran and hid their heads. They were so mediocre that it was mystifying that they are near the top. None of their players stood out in any way, neither good nor bad, just on the pitch flagging and flailing. They were so dull they didn't even have any funny hair or frilly shoes. Nine more opponents like that will do us fine.

Perhaps there is life in the dead dogs, for that old March madness drenched the old ground in one-eyed fervour. Anything and everything was roared on; even Colgan's deathly dripping got a momentary smidgeon of bile before a wave of support rolled out from the back of the Pontoon. En masse the mass turned on the boo-ers, not the team in the eleventh hour of need. We felt alive again: we are Grimsby, hear us roar!

Mr R Shoebridge (Derbys)
He is curious, yellow. He allowed advantages beautifully and was frequently tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. But now and again the rain got in his eyes and he saw painted castles in the air. He saw their elbow, but missed the hand of cod. He missed their hand, but saw our predicament and took pity upon the poor downtrodden Mariners masses. He was an antidote to the usual poison and gets a big thumbs up for generally being nice to Town. A cheerless Cherryman would put a minus before 8.434. It's just a question of perspective.

We've been fobbed off, fooled, robbed and ridiculed for so long that sometimes one swallow does make a summer.