Cod Almighty | Diary

Magic, our Maurice

23 October 2014

If the ebola virus has so far failed to wipe out most of humanity – which has presumably come as a terrible disappointment to the Daily Express – then at least cup fever has taken hold in North East Lincolnshire. That's according to our friends at the Grimsby Telegraph, who have covered the arrival yesterday of the FA Cup in Cleethorpes. As in the actual trophy, which is a physical object, rather than the tournament for which the trophy is awarded as a prize to the winner, which is the oldest extant football competition in the world, contested this season by 736 teams, 64 of which will take part in the competition's fourth qualifying round this Saturday, including Grimsby Town and Guiseley, who meet in tie number 3 at Blundell Park, kick-off 3 o'clock pm.

So yeah, BP was open for fans to have their picture taken with the famous old urn, which is presumably nice for people who it's presumably nice for. The Telewag, however, runs with one snap of the trophy flanked by Scott Neilson and Shaun Pearson and another featuring the year 8 boys' team from your original/regular Diary's alma mater, Havelock Comprehensive School. (Tory boy Ross can, naturally, stick his academy right up his Carphone Warehouse.)

Reading down the names of this team, I feel a little sad to note that the Era of Kids With Two Surnames and No First Name seems to have been superseded by the Era of Kids With the Same Names as Their Great-Grandads. The likes of Cole Mills and Oakley Luddington are all gone, and it's all Billy and Jack as far as the eye can see. One happy exception, though, is a lad called Lincoln Taff, and you can only imagine the fun the Telegraph will have if Lincoln one day plays for Grimsby.

Staying with young people and knockout competitions, if the FA Cup is contagious around Grimmo way just now, then sadly the FA Youth Cup can only be seen as a sort of sterile quarantine area. The flower of Grimsby youth was cut down on Tuesday evening in what commentators routinely describe as "the cruellest way possible" – with a drawn match and a lost penalty shoot-out. Good luck to our opponents in the next round – and look out for Abbey Hey FC surging past a club near you and into the Football League some time around 2018.

Two players who won't be lining up against Guiseley any time soon are Scott Brown and Danny Parslow, unless a Boshell-powered Guiseley batter the Mariners this Saturday and draw York City in the first round proper, and let's face it, nobody can rule that out. Midfield revelation Brown will be out for a month with the foot injury he sustained in last weekend's win at Torquay, and Parslow has been recalled from his loan to GTFC by those pesky Minstermen. That'll be Disley and McLaughlin in the middle this weekend, then, with Parslow's holding role presumably filled by a surprise swoop for Alfreton's promising young defensive midfielder Bradley Wood.

Last week we discovered that supporting football can be expensive. Today we're discovering it again. You know what, though? It's 2014. Everything is expensive except supermarket alcohol. Go figure.