Cod Almighty | Diary

Forty years young

15 August 2019

Hang on a moment will you? Middle-Aged Diary is just waiting to learn my xP and xJ ratings... Right, I'm expected to write 4.3 paragraphs containing 1.6 jokes that vaguely raise a titter. This takes no account of the fact it is Thursday and there is nothing happening in the world of Grimsby Town that you don't already know or can't guess. But I'll do my best.

Doing their best, also, are Grimsby Town Football Club. The appointment of Kelly Billings as GTFC family co-ordinator is hugely welcome. Not only because of the qualities Kelly herself is already bringing to the new role. It also means that someone at the club is listening to and engaging with the criticism which came its way after Nick Dale's novel approach to bringing the crowds back to Blundell Park.

If Town fans of my age and above take on a dreamy air at times over the next nine months, you can be confident they will be thinking of two Scots – one wispy, one fierce – a diminutive Irishman, and an astonishing assembly of local youngsters. Together, 40 years ago this season, Mike Brolly, Bob Cumming, Joe Waters and all were winning the third division for Grimsby Town. That after beating Everton on their way to the quarter-finals of the League Cup.

If ever a season deserved a book, it is 1979-80 – and Rob McIlveen has it in hand. If ever a team deserved to be fêted, again and again, even after all this time, it is that team.

The Mariners Trust is planning a reunion. The moment a date is agreed, cancel all prior engagements. If and when the reunion happens, you, like me, want to be there when Harry Clifton and Max Wright shake hands not only with the locally born Tony Ford and Kevin Drinkell, but with all that team, whether they came from Scotland, Ireland or Yorkshire. They all became "one of our own".