The Diary

Cod Almighty | Diary

NED RYERSON? BING!

2 February 2018

Wicklow Diary writes: The job of a Friday diary is to scan over the week's doings and pull at a loose thread that unravels to just under 800 words. This week there is no thread. No fractures or splinters and no b-side gem or hidden track album to introduce, just a hardened diamond of discontent. The Fishy, facebookers, tweeters, radio and print. Everyone is in agreement on media new and old: clear out the 'regimes' on and off the pitch. Fans that would still have Neil Woods in charge are in accord with the ones that want to sack the manager after Slade already. Even the normally cautious Telegraph is running a piece featuring Slade Out memes and banners. Well played GTFC, well played. It takes a lot to align opinion and feeling so effectively.

I had Radio Humberside on last night. They read yesterday's board statement out in full, no doubt expecting the switchboard to short out with the frothing rage. Not a single caller or message to read out. It's all been said. Baz Whittleton spoke for us all on Tuesday night.  How we effect the change that we want will be the challenge and is somewhat unclear. The timing for the Mariners Trust survey couldn't be better.

Longer term, take heart from Wimbledon and their latest milestone. They started from nothing in that London with a small hardcore and competition all around them. Soon they'll have their own ground, all on their own. They are almost like a 'what if' control subject for the stewardship of John Fenty. The fan-owned club have made up nine divisions on us and will now have their own stadium. All since they formed in 2002. 

We eat this elephant like any other, one bite at a time. In the short term, the challenge is how to show our support for the team and even whether to keep attending games. It's a different answer for everyone. If you choose to take a break, that's understandable. This hurts like hell: both the obvious problems as well as the perceived impotence to right them. There's a special pride in wearing your local team's shirt and we know it is not earned by days out at Wembley but by getting through times like these. We'll turn this corner and how we turn it and recover may well be a story in itself and add to that pride. As Baz said, it's our club, our history and our future.

I'm going to go to as many games as I can. Part of this is to deal with the problems faced by Big Dave Mariner head on.

We shouldn't have to focus on these things but here we are. What makes a day spent going to a game special, regardless of the 90 minutes in the middle? It's the rituals and routine that make a matchday. The friends you meet, the stupid in-jokes that no one else gets. The pre- and post-match chips. The pint or two perhaps. The sweets stash in the pocket, meted out throughout the game with enough leftover for next week. The casual exchanges in the queue for a half-time cuppa.

Sure, we'd prefer to be debating who we'd like to play in the playoffs or whether Cardwell's twenty goal season is on a par with Amond's thirty in the conference. Until then we can enjoy the gallows humour that is only conceived in the current adversity. Our own Tommy of the Town and Rich Lord's ace piece being exhibits A and B.

It's easier to marvel when you don't get to every game but I'm going to bring the kids and try to take pleasure in the things that will hopefully be remembered long after the result on the day. We might sit near the commentary box and I'll go all quiet as I point out Alan Buckley for the hundredth time. And James McKeown, looking like he's nearing a return. He's already joined Batch, Wainman and Tweedy by re-establishing the tradition of long serving keeper in the XI. Do you recognise Neil Woods over there from the John and Roly highlights videos?

There's Harry Clifton going through the pre-match warm-ups. He has never given up, never stopped smiling. We all hope he makes it, here or elsewhere. If not here, there will be a day when there's a local in the shirt joining Drinkell, Moore, Ford, North and others. The youth haven't had much of a break lately but they will. Could Sawyer and Keeble be the ones? Maybe Harry Cardwell will get his chance yet, he's banging them in during the warm-ups. How are Disley, Pearson, Amond and Bogle doing? They're not here but they left enough magic for my kids to retell for years to come. 

The events on the pitch? For the first time in yonks, tomorrow's visitors Cheltenham might not be the most despised people in Blundell Park. Like us, they've got seven loan players so maybe they will face some of our perceived problems.  Our dreadful recruitment means we may have 11 transient bodies on the pitch tomorrow and there's a good chance none of them will be here beyond May. If we get relegated will it really matter to them? Those who go to games between now and then will somehow have to make up for that potential shortfall. We have to help them be more than 11 temporary workmates with no bond beyond the end of the season. Somehow. 

On a positive note, I can't remember a nicer introduction than Easah Suliman's tweet on Wednesday. We know he probably says that to all the girls but how can a rookie pro conjure up more warmth and connection in a three-line tweet than our board has managed in fifty statements?

UTM.