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The value of nothing

27 July 2017

Devon Diary writes: Last night, the club confirmed what we've known for some time now, that centre-back Karleigh 'With a K Not a C' Osborne has signed for the club. It's pretty much been a done deal for a few days now, with clues such as a number on Tuesday's team sheet, rather than a 'T' and the player himself keeping us in the loop by tweeting that it was just a case of waiting for FA clearance. 

I've seen Osborne play a couple of times and reckon he's a decent signing, much the same as Danny Andrew was last summer – a good player looking for a club after struggling with injuries. He's a classic Slades freebie and we all hope it works out for him as he comes across as a thoroughly decent chap.

It's been a while since Grimsby Town did something that made me wince – days; maybe a week, even – but even for a club with such a rich history of faux pas, clangers and fuck-ups, today's news of the club insisting that the Cleethorpes Chronicle pay for access to interviews is particularly infuriating. 'Sponsorship', yes, but it's payment all the same.


This week's Chronicle carries the whole story on the back page, but in a nutshell, two weeks ago the club contacted the paper informing it that it would be expected to commit to some form of sponsorship for the coming season. When editor Nigel Lowther responded to say that the Chronicle staff actually do commit quite substantially in the form of season tickets, rather than taking free press passes, press officer Dale Ladson informed them that the club needed to "protect media value", implying that other outlets who pay (I'm guessing the Grimsby Telegraph and Radio Humberside) might get their arses in their hands about a local paper having free access to interviews.

Now, as Paul Savage pointed out pointed out on Twitter, the BBC pays broadcasting rights and the Telegraph sponsors the club in some way, but both are far bigger than the independent and locally owned Chronicle. The Telegraph is of course part of Trinity Mirror plc. 

"Unless you can commit to an advertising package for the forthcoming season, we cannot allow one-to-one access to our manager," Ladson is quoted as demanding. Of course, the Chronicle can't afford this – but neither should it have to! 

The club, as we know, has a history of this sort of thing. Back in 2007, after a disagreement between Burnsy and Town's then chairman (and current non-chairman), Radio Humberside lost the rights to commentate on Town and the contract was awarded to Compass FM, who struggled to broadcast owt worthwhile for a couple of seasons. A little further back the club fell out with a number of Telegraph hacks for reporting on what was referred to for a while as "Ambulancegate". 

It's been a while but I do hope we're not seeing a return to the days of PR disaster now we're back in the League. We're back in the big time, yeah, and we have more money coming into the club. But we still need goodwill and we still need to promote the club, and the Chronicle can and should play a part in that. 

The Mariners Trust has said it will raise this with the club but will they be heard? Given that their seat on the board is paid for, and public backing of the club is expected, the value of this is probably limited.

Make sure you pick up a copy of the Chronicle this week and read the full article. Needless to say, the club and Ladson in particular do not come out of this looking at all well. Maybe it's time to spend some money on someone with some PR nous rather than another midfielder? If you feel strongly about this, maybe take a minute to drop a (polite) line to the club and let them know. 

Back to the football and tonight a Town XI head to Winterton for a kickabout. I'd imagine that a lot of the players will be rested before the Wigan game on Saturday but we do know that Russ will be having a look at a Belgian left-back. You'll be able to find out what he thinks of him in whichever paper shells out for the privilege of asking him the questions after the game.