Cod Almighty | Diary

Let's not get overexcited... yet

23 April 2018

Irregular Diary writes: The penultimate away game of the season brought about a first win on non-BP, and therefore inferior, soil this calendar year. An absolute stonewall penalty won the game... We may jest but although I couldn't get there reports from fans suggest that we again have improvement in togetherness for team results. If you fancy a butchers at the match report it's here.

Seems Mr Jolley can polish a turd to some extent – but let's not get overexcited, because the team was a complete mess when he arrived. That's not me and my Grimsby talent of finding a negative in everything, but I won't be judging him until Christmas at least, when he's brought in his own players to fit his own style of play. I'm basically ready for a few weeks of Saturday nothingness and kids' football tournaments before I reach the end of May, where I get fed up again, and the countdown to pre-season friendlies. I find them much more enjoyable than real games sometimes. Beer in the sun on a terrace while the Mariners run riot and score a bucketful of goals – bliss!

Talking of terracing, if you've missed it there is currently an online petition to bring back standing in the top two divisions. I don't like the phrasing, because the current legislation, thanks to the Taylor Report, affects many clubs outside the Premier League and Championship. We all know Grimsby Town can't have standing because we were quite good at football in the early 90s – but we're not the only club. We're not the only club playing in a division surrounded by old-school terracing deemed far too dangerous in the top two tiers based on flawed information from a report rushed through as a reaction to the devastating events at Hillsborough in 1989.

The minister for sport, Tracey Crouch, recently announced that soon-to-be relegated West Bromwich Albion were not permitted to have safe standing, thus ignoring the Sports Grounds Safety Authority – the very body put in place to advise on such things.

The Premier League has chipped in with the results of survey suggesting that only 5 per cent of fans want to stand, except nobody has had sight of the survey form and you only had to look behind both goals at Wembley for the FA Cup semi-finals to know that's nonsense. In fact, I don't think I've been to an away game for quite some time where I've sat down. It's not enforced any more because there are just too many people to tell.

My kids toured non-League from 18 months old and had the time of their lives on open terraces, with no injuries other then the ones they inflicted on each other. In fact, the only time either have had any sort of injury was a few years ago at Kenilworth Road, when the youngest smashed their shin on the seat in front while celebrating.

So after my little rant, if you think Tracey Crouch and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport don't know what they are talking about, please sign the petition. With 100,000 signatures it will be considered for a debate in Parliament. OK, with my Grimsby hat on, it'll be a 10-second mention before it's gone. And sadly, it'll be the power of the top 6 – who want to cash in on increasing capacity without expanding stadiums – that will swing the power to fans in this debate. However, we must show these people that the choice to stand is not that of a small vocal minority but a far larger group of fans.

So back to the here and now, and our last home game of the season is against Notts County, who will hopefully bring a few. An atmosphere to match the Chesterfield game and a result to match Barnet's, and the job's a good 'un. It'll mean we can eat our KFC on the services before arriving in Nailsworth with Football League status guaranteed for another season.

UTM