Cod Almighty | Diary

Of mice, footballers and diarists

18 August 2021

"The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley" and Robert Burns should know: he was never inoculated. Grimsby's game against Bromley - the first of the new season, the first competitive game we'd have been able to attend in over 16 months - has been postponed due to positive Covid tests in the Town squad.

Tempting to say it is a sickener, except that it literally is a sickener. All our frustration at a further delay to what was already a late-starting season is compounded by an unknown number of Town players who must now be worrying about their health and the health of those around them. Safe to say that none of the squad will have been like the mouse in the Burns poem: "Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie, o, what a pannic's in thy breastie!" and now thinking "Thou need na start awa sae hasty" with another seven days before they take the field. Playing football is who they are: not being able to do it strikes at their very selves.

Against that, all the who loses and who gains calculations are paltry. So too the name-calling. Two other games in the Conference have already been postponed, and more further down the pyramid. No doubt there'll be more, if not this weekend then the next. This is not just about Grimsby Town. The postponement is worse than just an inconvenience, but let's not put on the blinkers of self-pity.

Middle-Aged Diary knows I have not told you anything you don't know. When Cod Almighty started almost 20 years ago, the diary was a necessary digest of the latest news for people who weren't in a position to check several news sites, and who certainly didn't have a mobile phone. Nowadays, our job is to try and reflect on it, to offer a fresh perspective, or, failing that, a vaguely chuckle-able line or two.

We always need new perspectives but now especially, as at least one gap is opening up in our roster of regular diarists, and we are keen to replace them with someone whose golden age of personal Town support occurred (or, we hope, will occur) in the 21st century. More details later this week, but we'll be launching a competition to find a new diarist, so be having a think whether you might fancy the gig. As I've often written before (an occupational hazard for a veteran diarist), the pay is lousy but the hours are good and sometimes the actual minutes are a joy.