Cod Almighty | Diary

Gudbuy T' Sense

31 March 2023

Firstly, an apology.

In my BOTB diary on the 24th March, I claimed that Walsall was a black hole of a town that had not contributed to human prosperity or progress in any meaningful way. However, my reader has pointed out that none other than Noddy Holder was born in Walsall and it therefore qualifies for a passing mention in the rock 'n' roll hall of fame.

Young people might not remember Slade, but hits such as Merry Xmas Everybody, Skweeze Me Pleeze Me and Gudbuy T’ Jane and having the half time team talk on the pitch at Lincoln when we were five goals down will always resonate with the older generation. Or, as Noddy would doubtless say: Wud Rezon8 Wit The Holder Gener8shun. Do you think there will be another famous man called Noddy in our lifetimes? I doubt it. Well done, Walsall!

We play Bradford tomorrow. I always think Bradford will be better than they are, because they have a big ground and lots of fans and stuff. As a general rule the further down the league clubs with large actual fan bases are the worse their management has been. In Bradford's case, many years in the bottom division, usually in the bottom half, would seem to indicate they have been run by drunken monkeys. This year they are play-off contenders but the general standard of the division hardly indicates they will be world beaters and it's hard to predict a winner. On the basis that I am usually wrong I'm going to go for the Brads, by the odd goal, or maybe even a normal one. Not that it really matters.

But, is there such a thing as 'doesn't matter' in football? The Walsall game 'didn't matter' but if they had won it at the end the look on their idiot goalkeeper's face would have given me nightmares for years. I've played in a lot of games that 'didn't matter' over the years but as soon as someone on the other team kicks you, trust me, it matters.

The Crawley game joined the Hartlepool and Harrogate horrors as matches we controlled and somehow threw away. If we had won those three games we would have had eight extra points and been in with an outside chance of the play-offs. Failure to kill off games like that is one of the most frustrating things in football. Retro Diary and I tend to look at each other whenever a ball bobbles about in the opponents' six-yard box, with our forwards displaying the killer instincts of a sheep, and roll our eyes. It's almost like we could really do with a goalscoring forward. Has anyone else noticed that, or am I going out on a limb here? Last year our pre-season break lasted about 17 minutes and we pretty much rushed onto the pitch in late July with our shorts on back to front and our shin pads in the boot, but hopefully a whole summer of a-thinkin' and a-tinkerin' by plucky little Town boss Paul Hurst will supply us with someone with the desire we need.

A thread on The Fishy has posters recalling truly inept performaces from Town players. A lot of those mentioned are predictable but I would like to put in a special mention for Tony Rees. Now, Rees was a very good player in a very good Town team, but Deviant Diary and I attended an away game at Colchester in the nineties in which – I swear to god – Rees fell over literally every time he touched the ball. It was like the tracking on his moustache had gone. Perhaps he had an inner ear infection, or perhaps someone had accused him of being a Weeble and he was determined to prove them wrong. We may never know what happened on that fateful night that led to his sense of balance misfiring. 

As always, good luck to the travelling army on the way to Bradford tomorrow. Delius comes from Bradford, you know – you may remember he had hits including On Heerin' Tha Firzt Cuckooooh Ov Spring and Ova The Hillz and Far, Far Away.

I'm not letting my reader catch me out again. 'Ave it.