Cod Almighty | Diary

No marking!

16 February 2023

It’s difficult to know what to say about the Mariners these days. Losing to opposition below you in the league is never easy to take, but what’s making them even harder to digest is the manner of the performances.

FA Cup run aside, Town’s season, and swagger, has ground to a halt. Paul Hurst won’t want to make excuses, but he has been without some key players for large chunks of this season, while he failed to land the additions he prioritised during the January transfer window. This is the squad he’s built, but it’s probably not the squad he envisaged.

Even so, it’s a squad good enough to make the fifth round of the FA Cup by continually defeating higher league opposition. Are key players protecting themselves for Southampton? None of them would admit it, of course, but psychologically this must be on their minds. Even the great Town team in 1998 lost its mojo once they’d booked their first ever trip to Wembley. We won just one of eight games between that night at Burnley and that beautiful win over Bournemouth in the capital.

More than anything, it feels like our mentality has shifted. Your West Yorkshire Diary hasn’t always subscribed to the accusation that Hurst plays so-called negative football but three at the back does feel like a holding tactic, designed to contain the opposition and make us hard to beat while he waits for key players to return from injury.

With a switch in system and a shift in personnel, our rhythm has gone. Highs in the cup, lows in the league. The two recent defeats have been by small margins, and they feel very similar to the ones we suffered last season at the likes of Wealdstone, Aldershot and Halifax. But we bounced back.

It’s a good time to take a break from the Fishy, and from social media, to avoid reading the thoughts of those who still find ways to devalue two promotions. If it felt like our wins over Crewe and Luton only denied you a chance to criticise the manager, then it seems you won’t ever be able to truly enjoy any good results when they come along.

Off the pitch, the club continues to show that it’s good to talk. They’ve chatted with Southampton and the Saints are now allowing our inflatable friend into the stadium a week on Wednesday — a good result, and we even got a catchy little headline that you wouldn’t expect from the official website.

And since we ran Rich Lord’s thoughts on the topic of increasing Blundell Park’s capacity yesterday, chair Jason Stockwood balanced honesty and openness with some pragmatism in his reply on Twitter to remind all of us that they are constantly listening.

Just two recent examples of events that reassure me, and many others I’d imagine, that the club is in good hands. It’s probably why I’m less panicky about this seven-point and four-game advantage over Hartlepool than others. Let's face it: losing to Colchester and Gillingham but taking something from Northampton would be a very Grimsby thing to do.

It’s easy to support the club when it’s riding the crest of a wave. Now’s the time it needs us more. Park the pessimism for just a moment and give these players the backing they need to rediscover some good form across these next four league games. Then we can have fun on the south coast.

UTM!