Cod Almighty | Diary
The opposite of creativity is cynicism
28 October 2016
Retro Diary writes: Once upon a time several years ago I had a brand new mobile phone stolen by a pickpocket in London. Immediately after it had happened, that bloke (I assumed it was a bloke – I don't know why), had a smart, shiny new phone in his hand, and I had naff all and a whole bunch of hassle. But would I swap my life for his? Not in a million years.
Well that's sort of how I feel about Cheltenham this week. Being deeply cynical might win you the odd football match, but it's not a philosophy to live your life by. At the end of the day, it isn't the way to get on. Town still can't seem to beat the feckers, but nevertheless, I came away from that game feeling thoroughly superior. All you have to do to be better than teams like that is sit back and let history take its course. For me, the curse is now dead.
What a shame Cheltenham didn't draw Guiseley in the FA Cup – what a mess that game would be. Both teams would be so busy diving all over the place I swear they'd forget about the ball altogether. Actually Guiseley are already out of the FA Cup, but - y'know – it's just a little fantasy of mine. A bit like Town getting Leicester away in the FA Cup and sending them our under 23s.
Nor, in exactly the same way, would I ever swap places with Shrewsbury Town. Even the decision of our manager to defect there doesn't make us feel in any way inferior to them. In his first interview as Shrews boss, Hursty looked nervous but was very assured. That he described the Shrews' soul-destroying new stadium as "lovely" already shows that we live on different planets. Indeed, if it were me, the prospect of spending my Saturdays in that tedious blue shed would be enough to put me off on its own.
No. To desert Town for Shrewsbury just seems like a straightforward error of judgment – indeed it's pretty difficult to see it any other way. Just a week after a magnificent 1,149 away fans at Cambridge sang the manager's name for a full twenty minutes without a break, it does seem like a particularly charmless and un-self-conscious piece of rejection, especially given how much we've all suffered on the vertiginous slopes of his learning curve over the last six years. And good luck trying to get Shrewsbury fans to raise £110,000 for the transfer budget, too. Still, it's his life, and he obviously sees it as some kind of promotion.
On the flipside, you could say it's a bit of a miracle Hursty lasted this long. That he survived the Rob Scott sacking was already slightly fortunate, and over the subsequent two or three years he developed a knack of pulling wins out of the hat every time he seemed one game from the sack. The 'tug of god' at Braintree got him out of trouble again, because I'm absolutely certain that without that penalty, Town would still be a non-League club today.
An undoubted talent for plucking great players from nowhere (for which we'll always be grateful), and a rather gentle management style which made his teams unnaturally loyal to him, were offset by manifest tactical weaknesses, and those good old Yorkshire vices of contrariness and never letting evidence spoil a good opinion. His move has, I suspect, turned us all into keen Shrewsbury-watchers, and personally I can't wait for the first post-defeat interview – the one where the bloke from Radio Shropshire finds out that you have to talk to him like a four-year-old or he flies off the handle. More worryingly for Shrews fans, with his team sitting comfortably bottom, is that Hursty might have to learn how to set a team up to win at home when the opposition aren't overly bothered about scoring. Whoooops. Still, it's not our problem now – we can sit back, crack open the popcorn and enjoy the show.
But nobody can deny that Hursty left our team in a much better place than he found it. Whether you think he propelled us purposefully and skillfully to success, or did his best to make a foregone conclusion look difficult, Hursty was part of our lives for six years, and presided over one of the most remarkable times for GTFC in living memory. It was often frustrating and sometimes emotional. And just once, it was really momentous. For that alone, we hand him his place in the hall of fame. I give you Paul Hurst, 2011-2016, and that, ladies and gentlemen, could be the last we hear of him, as in one final act of contrariness he's posted himself way out into football's long grass where he stares ignominy in the face.
As for his successor, discussions may be well underway behind the scenes, but we've been told in no uncertain terms that such knowledge isn't for the likes of us. As Trans-Pennine Diary's excellent analysis on Wednesday showed, the only thing that tells you whether a manager is a good appointment or not is hindsight. Managers seem to win promotions almost at random – as though suddenly it becomes their 'turn'. Maybe managers make less difference than you think, and promotion just comes down to playing budget and chance. If the division's 24 managers were all useless, one of them would still have to finish top.
As long as we appoint somebody who commands reasonable respect among the players I'll be relatively happy - mind you, that already rules out three quarters of the names mentioned. Nigel Adkins, as I'm sure you know by now, has disappointingly ruled himself out, and today's Telegraph seems to have begun 'positioning' us to accept Curtis Woodhouse, although maybe I'm reading too much into it. I need to go and think about something else for a couple of days, maybe.
Tomorrow for Town, it's the middle of three long trips to the west country in fairly quick succession. Whether one of the longest away games of the year is what we actually needed at this point is a matter of opinion – maybe, with a bit of luck, it will take a bit of the pressure off the players.
Yeovil's independent website is amusingly called 'Ciderspace' – a name in perfect keeping with the fact that I can't take any team in the west country beyond Bristol seriously. I realise fully that statements like that will come back to bite me, especially with Yeovil having won their last three matches 1-0, and therefore being on what might be described as a very low-scoring winning streak. But I just can't bring myself to care about that – the day we're scared of Yeovil, we're scared of life. Come on Town, ffs.
For us, Mister Grimsby, Dave Moore, takes temporary charge, and he hints at no radical changes. We will have a stand-in physio for the day, and presumably Dave will have to wear long trousers despite a temperature in excess of minus fifteen. On the playing side, Ben Davies is still out, and Sean McAllister needs an op on his groin, so don't expect him to return any time soon. The rest are fine.
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