The Diary

Cod Almighty | Diary

Car Trouble Parts 1 and 2

29 June 2018

Wicklow Diary's car has packed in. I'm sick as a parrot, Jim. The shrewdly acquired aging veteran that I hoped would be a Paul Futcher or Garry Birtles has turned out to be a Peter Beagrie; expensive to run and prone to leave you purple-faced and shouting at the sky. Nevermind. How about that weather, eh? When is this eternal shadow getting here you Imps, we could do with it on days like today.

Preseason training has started, so we can take one eye off the World Cup for minute. Good timing too, as you can guarantee the second-guessing over last night's line-up will be most tiresome and destructive. Besides, Belgium did the exact same and no one is giving them a grilling. It's done, move on, three winnable games and it's the World Cup final. 

The players rocking up to Cheapside this week had a different air about them compared to recent seasons. That's air, not hair but that was different too. There was a lot of what the CA match reporter would call Very Sensible Hair. Not a mullet, top-knot or hair band to be had. Even Harry Cardwell's lopped it all off. No big Billy Bumblebeards to slow us down either. Heads straight from the framed black and whites at the barber shop your mum used to drag you to, with that nasty number one clippers that gave you the shivers.

I digress. Believe it or not but hair wasn't the most important thing about these players. They arrived as our players. Not a loanee in sight and as the CA contract tracker can confirm, the majority on, or starting, two years. Players who are moving to the area. Who've bought into what Michael Jolley is selling. Who might see GTFC as a wage yes, but also as a club and a town that represents more than just an upgraded set of alloys on their next car.

Players who might get the club, the town, the people. That excites me as a supporter. You travel to Exeter and Carlisle at the weekend to cheer them and get a selfie with them in Tesco during the week. If not a selfie, at least a stalk through the frozen section from a safe distance trying to gather the courage for an "Are you Dave Worthington?" moment. Grimsby and NE Lincs is often presented as an odd outpost. A location that is hurdle for managers to overcome in attracting players. However, it is interesting that once lured here, it's not that unusual to settle and stay. We're quite a nice lot once you get to know us. 

No guarantees come with all this, apart from opposing team fanzines not being able to laugh at our hair. It's encouraging to get a settled squad in place before June is out but it's just one piece. Give me a Lever long enough and a Futcher on which to place it, and I shall move the world as Alan Buckley once famously didn't say. Our last automatic promotion 27 (TWENTY-SEVEN) years ago probably wouldn't have happened without picking up a crocked striker who only met his teammates for the first time at the services on the way to the opening game of the season. (Middle Aged Diary is on holiday. Otherwise I know he would have edited out the 'probably' in that sentence.) Neil Woods was the fulcrum for the Buckley lever.

Not all Jolley's business is done. Among two or three others, we need a goalscorer. Preferrably one of those 23-ish non-league dudes that scored thirty last season. He might already be 'in the building' for all I known. The footage on the SNOS had some unfamiliar faces equally likely to be a 30-goal machine with thundercannon for a right foot or a bloke collecting his pool table. 

Fixture news. The first preseason game with Cleethorpes has been moved forward to 1230pm. Not on police advice to avoid derby dust-ups between local knuckle-draggers but so we can watch England in the WC quarter-final. 

What could possibly go wrong? At least the game is still on. For reasons unknown, our friendly at York has been cancelled. Murmurings suggest plod was actually involved in this decision. Mmmmm. Our sympathies if you've booked your travel already. As a consolation the railway museum is magnificent. As is the long-sleeved Town shirt in the picture accompanying the announcement on the official site. Phwwoooar, that's hotter than this weather. See yers.