Cod Almighty | Diary

This timeless troupe of hope inspirers

2 August 2018

Two more days and nothing to do but imagine. Your A46 Diary has been imagining stories and how they have rules. The rules aren't complicated and follow some well-established guidelines, particularly in popular narratives. First, we expect a setting which will reflect the events and the emotions of the characters, an environment, a time and the all-important weather to match characters' moods and predict hope or despair. Then a protagonist as hero, an antagonist as villain, helpers on each side, a mentor for the hero and a princess to rescue. And of course it needs a plot. A simple thing, such a small thing, just what happens when and why. How complicated could it be?

Stories come in lots of different packages. For this narrative, popular or not, imagine a play. The action is live, scripted and planned, but much will be left to the 90 minutes' traffic of our stage.

Now imagine theatre as installation, art and expression within performance. Imagine a play with two directors. Then imagine two separate casts who don't meet until they're on stage. Finally, imagine an audience bisected, and place yourself in one section or the other.

Imagine the hush and then the rush as the play begins and the divided audience quickly realises there is no clear script; the directors have to release their casts and hope they can perform as rehearsed. There will be heroes, different from the last performance and the same. But here, at the start of a new season, everything is new, everything is possible.

Heroes emerge, helpers are everywhere – at times too many to realise – and the villains are all there. For every hero and helper on each side there is an opposite, a goblin, a minion, a bruiser, a thug; and above them all the glamour of the romantic, Gothic antagonist.

The division is clear. To some. The divided audience watches, shouts, tries to break the fourth wall as if they could affect the story; the division between Gothic and heroic is never clear as the action moves and switches and twists and rises. Helpers aid heroes, villains thwart, minions break and the Gothic is delicious, as it is denied and perhaps especially as it is feared. The story is magnificent: simple, complex, mundane, thrilling, indefinable by genre.

The interval. The audience maintains its segregation but forgets its antipathy. There will be time later but there will be others in the next performance.

Resume. The same actors, but the characters shift. The directors have had their time as mentors and now the movements change. The Gothic antagonist for whichever side now moves with a grace reserved for this stage where only the truly majestic will fly.

My kids are so taken with Clifton that he'll only have to touch the ball more than once a game and he'll be forever enshrined in their memories, hero and protagonist for the next 60 years in at least two people's memories

The plot comes in seconds-long bursts: a touch here, a tackle there, a shot! A save! The audience need the whole performance, a season of performances, to come anywhere near to understanding this plot, but in the moment all can share in that flick or motion, front of stage or lost in the in the chorus, that run, that connection between performer and performer, performers and audience.

At the beginning the audience learns with the actors, learn when to applaud, when to jeer, when to cry and when to cheer. But each moment is new and the hero, Gothic or otherwise, black or white, and black and white, will emerge to protect or to attack, to help or to foil, to win or to lose.

Before the curtain rises, Clifton continues the NE Lincs love-in with reminders about how well settled he is because he's one of our own. Apparently that means his family are here too. I shouldn't be flippant. My own kids are so taken with him that he'll only have to touch the ball more than once a game and he'll be forever enshrined in their memories, meaning he'll be hero and protagonist for at least the next 60 years in at least two people's memories.

Only sport gives this and only football can do it so pervasively. Last week I talked about losing our independence; we should think about the Cliftons, the Wrights and the Crofts; the Fords, the Drinkells and the Moores and the stories they have allowed us to write before we give up our identities.

Max Wright is certainly talking the talk and his comments about how much has changed back stage at Blundell Park are interesting, if only for the fact that players seem more able to communicate in this new era. Oh, and if you're looking for a maverick hero, someone who breaks all sorts of moulds, never really achieves but writes some interesting stories, try a John Oster.

Jordan Cook reveals something of the first draft of the script and tells us what we already know about pre-season: players don't know each other but they will soon, and the boys will be trying their best. He does, however, assert that he is a striker rather than a withdrawn forward and the Grimsby Telegraph has dutifully included him in its consideration for who will be the top scorer in its "is it essential to have a 20-goal striker in a promotion-winning side?" filler piece. Apparently it doesn't matter that much. Sorry to spoil that story.

And your A46 Diary will provide the denouement with the shocking news that Jolley likes his backroom staff and that they all have energy. Lots and lots of energy, like Duracell bunnies on Oreo McFlurries, or something. Anyway, he likes them and... oh, just like Oreo McFlurries. The season can't start soon enough; there are too many stories to write to wait much longer and too many rules to break. In Ben Fisher's script, however, the Mariners don't even get a speaking part.

So let's make new heroes, defy genre conventions and beat the popular narrative, starting in two days' time. In the swirl of the stage's traffic, the Gothic hero emerges, determined to break the rules of narrative, remind all that this is no morality tale, this is melodrama: imagine he starts the move, somewhere centre stage, his minions smother and eclipse helpers, heroes are nowhere to be seen, the tragedy unfolds, the audience knows, won't watch but will, then that great crow sweeps forwards to the front, teeters over the audience, teases, spreads is black wings and delivers the killing blow.

The fourth wall finally breaks as the audience realises what is missing: they are the princess and they have not been saved. But some have and their saviour is not Gothic, does not spread its crow wings, but swoops as an angel. The split is now profound and the jealousy, the bitterness, the hatred for this final act by these clandestine actors as they yell their bravos fills the audience with bile so strong it is a physical thing, a sickness from the performance. It is exquisite.

Now imagine that it's not over, that heroes arise from the beneath the crow's shadow, that the light, both black and white, shines brightest after the storm. Pick one, pick two, pick more. They'll do. New actors enter as others exit. In this story the weather doesn't matter; triumph in storms, fail in sunshine; slide into obscurity when there are but a few clouds in the sky and defeat all when the snow falls. In this story the weather cannot be controlled and all know that the sun will shine before and after each act. So let's imagine the sun shines, the clouds break, spotlights fall on our heroes. They are energised, the stage is theirs, the Gothic is lessened in the glare, shielding his eyes, his minions diminished. Now the glory awaits, now the protagonist rises as the mentor urges and the helpers wake and realise their role. Heroes will be born.

The audience knows it. We know it.

The stage is set and football will break the rules.