Cod Almighty | Diary

Some people believe football is a matter of life and death

3 February 2014

Miss Guest Diary writes: There's just no pleasing some people, is there. Town beat Tamworth 4-1 and there are still moans out there about the performance. Even from the manager who, in his post-match interview, said he was "far from satisfied". And, before I persuaded him otherwise, the curmudgeonly Mr Butcher was threatening not to award anyone man of the match. Check out who he eventually plumped for.

When I was training to be a counsellor, I learned a very valuable life lesson: you don't always have to be brilliant, just good enough on the day to help someone. And Town were good enough on Saturday to win, good enough to restrict Tamworth to a couple of chances, good enough to score four goals and good enough to reach the semi-finals of the FA Trophy. What more do people want?

Yes, I know that John-Lewis missed a sitter, that Tamworth's goal came from some sloppy defensive play, that Joe Colbeck was having one of those days when he couldn't keep the ball. But let's face it: if these players could perform brilliantly every week they'd be playing at a much higher level in the football pyramid. Most of the time the current set of players is good enough to secure victory at non-League level and I, for one, am very pleased to have them. SO SHUT UP AND STOP MOANING.

Sorry, I got a bit carried away there. What I meant to say was: I respect your right to express differing views but it would be more helpful to look for the positives in the current situation.

We have to wait until tomorrow to find out who Town's semi-final opponents will be, but I'm hoping it's Cambridge. First because playing them over two legs, rather than in the pressurised environment of a Wembley final, makes a Town victory more likely. And second for the purely selfish reason that it's the easiest ground for me to get to and my brother lives nearby. So a win-win situation – which is what I would anticipate from Town over the two legs, having seen Cambridge's lacklustre showing last week.

Oh, and the Dartford away game on 15 February, which has been displaced by the first leg of the FAT semi-final, will now take place on Tuesday 11 February.

Finishing on a more serious note, I saw on Twitter at the weekend that there will be a collection at Blundell Park on Saturday as part of a fundraising campaign to pay for cancer treatment abroad for a local woman, Debra McNaughton. You can read Deb's story here and, if you can't get to Blundell Park, maybe you could make a donation online. Despite what Bill Shankly may have said, there are some things in life which really are more important than football.