The Diary

Cod Almighty | Diary

The crime of the Mighty Mariner

16 August 2016

"God save thee, Mighty Mariner, from the fiends that plague thee thus."

Well, what a hullaballoo over some foam foolery. 'Twas but ten or eleven sunsets ago that a national newspaper identified the return of the Mighty Mariner as one of the five great things about the return of football. Your most Deviant of Diaries notes that's the Mighty Mariner, not a Mighty Mariner (plus VAT).

So a self-made fridge magnet knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. What's new? This is a man who couldn't see the problem with charging 50p to pee. In Cleethorpes.

Someone, somewhere is already writing their entry into BBC Radio Potato's folksong competition: The Ballad of the B Team Brouhaha. How did the Cleethorpes Cookie Monster crumble into a rolling news rumble of recriminations and rancour? Our famous foamster had simply stepped out of character, in real-life time as a real-life human person, to make piquant observations about the abhorrent branding exercise that is the EDL Cup, or whatever the LDV Auto Paint Trophy is called these days. Corporate-level interpersonal skillsets failed to meet the Target Operating Model optimum, and hilarity ensued.

Oh what fun the twitterati have had with the Fentygift that keeps on giving. Hats off to @GazReynolds for identifying the hitherto untapped marketing opportunity of the unique matchday experience.

 

He used to mow for Arsenal, you know. Keep 'em rolling in at #GTFCExperience.

Always ahead of the corporate game, Cod Almighty had already trialled the monetising of the matchday match reporter experience on Saturday. A competitively priced package has been put together offering other unique, authentic matchday experiences such as munching corned beef sandwiches at half time with additional moaning about Dominic Vose, and pre-match complimentary orange juice (with ice) together with obscure references to the niche end of 1970s rockular-type music. The premium package includes an opportunity to write that difficult Thursday diary, the day after nothing happens.

The world beyond our shores is a strange place. It wasn't like that when I were youthly young. We were happy with a clay pigeoner finishing fourth. So are you sitting down watching this crumbling land's finest sitting down and winning things? At least we know the secret of Britain's cycling success: no Brazilians in Brazil. It's the appliance of science. Team GB have a rolling programme of marginal gains; Team GTFC apply a marginal deficits policy.

Oh yes, and Town have a unique matchday experience at Colchester tonight. Disley's head has mended enough for him to get out of the building and onto the bus, but not off the bus into the changing rooms and onto the pitch. The bus might even turn up on time. Now that would be a unique matchday experience.

Town: back in the League and back to normal. John Fentycon? It's like shooting feet in a barrel.