Cod Almighty | Diary

Watching the hamsters on their wheels

21 August 2020

If Domestic Diary has a philosophy, it is get to the point.

Not for me, the excited speculation about a season opener in Walsall and the obvious jokes about bank holiday derbies against Morecambe and Salford. There are people paid to spin some fluff about what is basically a list of dates and teams, and best presented as such. I'm not one of them.

Whether Casual Diary, Patrick Conway or anyone else will be able to watch Town at Morecambe this year it is too early to tell, but Patrick does have some advice for anyone visiting what was of course the birthplace of national treasure Thora Hird. He suggests a visit to its Midland Hotel, "an architectural gem redolent of the 1930s, when Town would limber up for FA Cup semis at Cleveleys just down the coast. Refreshment was taken on the veranda after the win last August, while watching the RNLI rescuing plodgers on the quicksands of Morecambe Bay. Then back to Durham for our chip stop at Kirkby Stephen."

It is not going to be a normal season, and it certainly is not looking like a normal pre-season. We have just one friendly arranged. Perhaps manager Ian Holloway is preparing some probables v possibles matches. Do you think top flight teams with their inflated squads have to arrange vanishingly small chance v not a snowball's hope in hell trials?

The sense of the world not quite spinning as it should on its axis is heightened by the news that Alan Buckley will not be summarising alongside John Tondeur for BBC Humberside this season. It is probably not the reason he is stepping down but apparently some listeners think he was too negative. Some would call that telling it as it is. We wouldn't know though. Cod Almighty has always had a reputation for sunny optimism.

Some traditions are being preserved however. One is the combination of the words "Mariners", "goalkeeper" and "net" in a single headline, as Grimsby Town Women welcome Danielle Richardson, formerly of Boston United, to their ranks.

Another is the men playing a pre-season opener against Cleethorpes. That happens tomorrow. Although fans are now being let in to games between sides from steps three and under in the non-League pyramid, that doesn't apply to us, yet, but you can watch a live stream of the game.

Enjoy it if you watch.