Cod Almighty | Diary

Are litter rules shop counter-productive?

19 June 2015

Retro Diary writes: It's fair to say that in the last couple of seasons Town seem to have had particular difficulty signing strikers. Of course we weren't alone. Shortage of firepower is a common problem at all levels of football outside the top handful of clubs, and decent goalscorers are like gold dust. As one moves downwards through the leagues, the supply of really good ones seems to dry up horribly quickly.

There's no doubt that Town's 'end of the line' location can be a problem when it comes to attracting players. There was a time when the team bus used to leave Blundell Park for an away match with just two players on board, Peter Bore and Danny North: all the others would be picked up somewhere en route. Nowadays, any new recruit upping sticks and moving to Lincolnshire's outer rim is seen as showing commitment to the Mariners' cause above and beyond what is strictly necessary. We like them all the more when they treat our town like a place worth living in.

If you're lucky, you can pick up a locally raised player for whom 'here' is already home, rather than it being somewhere they've hardly heard of at the arse end of nowhere. This seems to have been a deciding factor in landing young Danny East, a native of Hessle, last seen kicking a football in distant Portsmouth. East said all the right things about joining Town, but I wonder if a Hull boy can ever really see himself as a Grimsby hero?

Maybe he can – I suppose players don't care about these things quite as much as those of us with more entrenched sensibilities would like to think. All I can say on the subject is: what a pity Danny East never played alongside Danny North.

In the higher leagues, defensive errors are punished mercilessly by a good centre-forward. But one of the things I actually like about the Conference is that even when the opposition are through on goal, or with a simple sitter to polish off, you still hold out hope that they'll miss, and they frequently oblige. Indeed, we've done it ourselves often enough. Ability to finish reliably is rare in this division, and as a consequence, a half-decent goalscorer can very nearly get you promoted on his own.

The best two Town forwards of the non-League era have been Hearn and Connell. Both were special in their own way – Hearn strong and direct, Connell a wonderful finisher, despite spending 88 out of every 90 minutes looking like a boy lost. Both of them had a natural instinct for standing in the right place, which for a striker is half the battle. I still don't know why we couldn't have kept Connell for longer; something amiss off the field no doubt, but that's the sort of information they don't trust the likes of me with.

Recently, the happy Hearn and Connell interludes have been starting to look like a golden aberration. Then, as if by magic, the future comes into focus, and we're all overtaken by Boglemania. Is he good? We're told so. Our new signing has had the monumental good fortune to time his arrival to coincide with the biggest tsunami of positivity ever seen, and he must be drunk on the euphoria.

It was the fee, now believed to be £30k, that did it for us, with other interested parties, who we understand included Sheffield United, Port Vale, Walsall, Wrexham and Gateshead, either unwilling, or more likely unable, to scrape together any sort of fee for him at all. There's just no money around these days, and the fans' fund, now past the £50,000 barrier, is already making a difference, which is incredible. Well done us – and don't stop the giving.  

I am told that Bogle is left-footed; he has a 'languid' style, but a habit of popping up in the right place and finishing well. That can be enough to succeed completely at any level, if true. Importantly, though, we need to give him a honeymoon period – a chance to adapt to his new surroundings and new levels of pressure. Bogle only played in front of more than a thousand fans on three occasions last season, although almost 3,000 watched him play away at Stockport.

Also, Conference North defences, against whom he scored his goals, aren't always that clever. Mind you, Conference Premier ones aren't exactly impossible to score against either.  Except ours, we hope.

To attempt what would be a stunning double coup, Hursty has yet again approached 27-year-old Ryan Bird, who was such a thorn in our side for Cambridge. He has a history of knocking us back – that old 'end of the line' thing again – but if we were to succeed, we would truly have sorted out the most difficult position on the pitch with time to spare. Bird has the track record and the nous – we know what we would be getting, although he will be attracting interest from higher clubs so don't get his name on your new stripy shirt just yet.

In contrast, Omar is a good lad by all accounts, and still young. We should be prepared to wait as long as it takes for him to find his feet, and one way or another, he could be paying us back for years.

Town have also now made official their interest in Chester's Kingsley James. He was their standout player in the ill-fated game earlier this year, and owes us one. He can start with a haircut.

Well done to everybody. It's the most exciting June I can ever remember.