Cod Almighty | Diary

This is another for fifty-somethings I'm afraid

20 January 2015

Let's start with a question. Manager Jose Mourinho has been claiming that the FA, the Premier League, referees, even ballboys, are in a "conspiracy" against his club, Chelsea. Do his comments make you:

a) Think better of Chelsea
b) Think worse of Chelsea
c) What do you mean, how could I possibly think 'worse' of Chelsea?

If your answer is a, I think you are probably reading the wrong website. If your answer is b or c, remember that the next time you are inclined to blame an opposing club for having their own interests, the FA and Conference for not organising a tournament entirely to meet our convenience or the weather for making it rain in January. Ask yourself: "What would Jose do?" Then do the opposite.

It rained yesterday. Grimsby will try and play Gateshead on Wednesday instead. That means we could be playing any one of three clubs next Saturday (given that it might still be raining on Wednesday). Yes, that makes planning difficult. But it is no-one's fault. Get on with it. Even watching Saturday's game on a laptop, you could tell that everyone involved with the club – players, officials, fans – had got it right. It was, in short, positive. Let's not lapse back into giving ourselves excuses to fail.

Middle-Aged Diary is not so deluded as to imagine we'll ever return to the days of infinite replays, but they generated some epic tales. Even I'm not old enough to remember the attendance record for Old Trafford that we don't talk about: 9,282, in 1964, for a second replay of a first-round FA Cup tie between Town and Barrow. That's the lowest ever gate at what is now the home of Mammon United. Footballing solidarity was maybe stronger in those days. It's reported that the turnstile operators donated their fees to Barrow, who were in the middle of a financial crisis.

I do, though, still remember listening to the reports on Radio 2 as Town first equalised and then struck the bar in extra time in a League Cup quarter-final replay against Wolves in 1979-80. The second replay was played on 18 December at Derby's old Baseball Ground and we lost 2-0. Their first goal, I like to think, was a controversial penalty (if you were there, share). At one point that season, we were in the lower half of the third division, but with several games in hand. After Wolves beat us, we lost just more three matches, one against Liverpool at Anfield, and stormed to the title. Fixture congestion did not do us any harm.

Changing the subject, Everton last night drew a blank after two players fought over who would take a penalty, which was then missed. This brought back memories of a match at West Ham in March 1993. The Hammers scored twice in the first ten minutes – but if the result was a foregone conclusion, no-one told the Mariners. We clawed our way back into the game and earned the right to play some football, and to be fair that West Ham side were no slouches themselves.

Still two down, we won a rather soft penalty for handball. There was some confusion over who would take the kick. Dave Gilbert had been our penalty taker for a while, but Clive Mendonca was relatively new to the team and had taken a few in Gilbert's absence. As I picture it, Clive was walking to the spot, the ball balanced on one hand, when Diddy snatched it from him. I definitely recall Mendonca looking distinctly put-out. Gilbert ran up confidently and hit the ball with all his usual vigour onto the underside of the bar. The woodwork at Upton Park wobbles to this day, but the ball stayed out.

In the end we had to content ourselves with a 'one that got away' story and a peerless goal by Paul Groves. He juggled the ball a couple of times to make room in the West Ham box, then volleyed past the West Ham keeper.

I am not sure there are any contemporary lessons in all that. But frankly the moment we need an excuse for reminiscing about a match involving Gilbert, Groves and Mendonca is the day Grimsby Town ceases to be a living, breathing thing and the possessor of a fair proportion of our hopes (and an even greater proportion of our fears).