Cod Almighty | Diary

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21 February 2013

Are you one of those Town fans who heads for the exit gates with five or ten minutes left to play, regardless of the score? Your original/regular Diary has never understood this, and it was with some pleasure that I heard the story of the Manchester City fans who slunk out while they were losing to Gillingham in the 1999 third division play-off final. And then jumped out of their train when City equalised and ran back along the track in a vain effort to re-enter Wembley. You expect the players to perform for 90 minutes? Well, do your bit as well. Beating the traffic? You're in Cleethorpes. There isn't any.

And while we're about it, don't get me started on people who phone up the local radio station for a post-match moan about things that they're basically just making up. I particularly enjoyed one caller to Radio Humberside a year or two back, who was incandescent with rage at the inadequacy of the as yet unidentified player Town were definitely going to sign to replace Luton's Michael Reddy when he was definitely sold to Luton.

So if you haven't already had the pleasure, I urge you now to meet Sky Blues Dan: not only a premature leaver of the stadium, but one who then vents his tiresome disgruntlement on the airwaves when clearly not in possession of the facts. Dan! Dan! Shut up! You won!

Back on the grimy bit of England's east coast, tickets are selling like hot tickets for the second leg of Grimsby Town's FA Trophy semi-final against Dartford this Saturday. The Mariners, of course, lead the tie 3-0 after last weekend's opener, and with just 100 tickets remaining it seems Grimbarians are flocking south this weekend the hope of cheering their heroes on to Wembley. That's assuming there were more than 117 tickets available to begin with, of course.

Looking ahead to Saturday's game, Dartford have thrillingly failed to overturn the red card awarded to their midfielder Lee Noble in last week's first leg following a late clash with Aswad Thomas. Noble will now miss the second leg as an immediate four-game suspension begins. "The referee didn't see the incident – he's purely gone on what the linesman told him," complains Darts manager Tony Burman, for all the world as if that wasn't exactly what referees are supposed to do when they don't see an incident.

Four first-team players turned out for Town's reserves yesterday in a 1-1 draw at Rotherham, where Dayle Southwell continued his impressive scoring record for the stiffs but also missed a late penalty. When I say Rotherham, I mean whichever nearby mud-drenched spoil heap the home team are currently using to stage their reserve games. And when I say four first-team players, I mean three first-team players and Greg Fleming.

Lastly today, we have another Anthony Elding limerick! Our thanks to Steve Evison for this beauty:

There once was a Town star called Elding
Renowned for his time online trending
But after another missed sitter
He disappeared from Town and from Twitter
As his goal drought showed no sign of ending

I particularly enjoy the way Steve begins this verse by adhering to the dactylic rhythmic stricture of the limerick form, approximating Elding's confident approach play and positioning, only to lurch into metrical chaos in the fourth line, representing Elding's tendency to fall over his own feet and twat the ball massively wide from right in front of an open goal.

Thanks for reading, folks – don't take your football too seriously, enjoy the rest of your week, and I'll see you next time.