Cod Almighty | Article

by Richard Dawson

6 July 2006

Stockport County? Who might they be?
County be a little club who soldiered on in the lower leagues for a hundred Earth years or so before being randomly chosen for takeover by aliens who had as much idea about English football as those nice men from Budweiser. They tried to take the club to another town; they tried to change the shape of the ball and all the rules of the game; and at one point they introduced one of their own as player-manager. A chap (if you can call an alien a chap; lack of time and inclination, frankly, prevents me from researching that piece of intergalactic etiquette) who had assumed the name of Carlton Palmer in a sort of weird Vauxhall/biscuit homage. Which is what happens when aliens absorb the local culture using Google. And which also explains his insistence in basing training around the ancient Gotland sport of rövkrok. The squad objected – just like the England squad didn't like it when Glen Hoddle made them do keepy-uppy all the time with him showing off in the middle of the circle. Palmer's long alien leg tentacles made him a natural leg wrestler. The rest, of course, is history.

It took an untelevised visitation from Doctor Who to sort things out. The Doctor got Carlton fired and pointed his sonic screwdriver at the local fans, who promptly woke up and formed a supporters' trust to take over the club. The one thing he forgot to do before he left was, sadly but predictably, to improve the footballing skills of the playing squad, who lost more games than anyone ever over the next few seasons.

Last season
"Chris Turner's proven ability at this level plus vigorous vocal support at home and away, fuelled by a sugar rush of optimism from the trust buyout, equals an irresistible springtime surge into the play-off positions," predicted Pete Green, writing last season's Cod Almighty rough guide to County. How right he nearly was. The only thing our Pete got wrong was "play-off positions", which should have read "out of the relegation positions". An easy mistake to make in the lower divisions, don't you find? Five points adrift of everybody at Christmas, it took the sacking of Mr Turner and the instatement of County legend 'ghostly' Jim Gannon to instigate a remarkable sequence which saw County lose only one of their last six matches and scramble one step above the Conference trapdoor on the very last day of the season.

Anticipate with relish
The fact that Stockport's fans have been much better of late in following their team to away games. I'm told that they took 1,400 to Barnet and that their party trick involves the travelling fans holding cards up to spell "12" (as in "we are the 12th man") just like those CGI people do on matches on the telly.

Anticipate with dread
"Gannon led County slowly away from relegation albeit with not very attractive football. He tended to rely on hopeful punts upfield for the strikers to chase."

The way forward
Jim Gannon's proven ability at this level plus vigorous vocal support at home and away, fuelled by a sugar rush of optimism from the trust buyout, equals an irresistible springtime surge into the play-off positions.

By the way, if you are interested in completing a fascinating questionnaire about leg wrestling between the opposite sexes, just click here. That really has to be the way forward, don't you think?