Cod Almighty | Diary

Maybe, I don't really wanna know how yer garden grows

20 April 2023

It's nearly noon and here is your Guest Diarist to quickly write a short gonzo stream of consciousness. Fresh in from five hours growing and nurturing things and with an end of season time need to tell you what I think about the future of the Mariners. You ain't gonna like it much but, as the young ones say, it's my truth and you have to prove otherwise.

You might find this unpalatable but I firmly believe that the maximum long term sustainable league position in this cash-crazy twenty first century football world is lower than most Mariners fans are prepared to admit. I reckon the best we can hope for is to be a mid table third division club. Any higher and we are flying too close to the sun and will just crash back down again. And when that happens, like in snakes and ladders, the relegation snake can leave you a lot lower than when the ambitious plans started. Yes, modern progressive owners like the Ethical Brothers can adroitly improve the income streams (they are a long way head of Fenty's fabled seven day income streams and being landlord to a bloody garden centre or summat at a new stadium in the middle of nowhere). But the best they can ever reliably do is to get the club to break even and currently (unexpected once in a generation cup runs aside) they are quite a long way from that even with more season tickets sold than I can ever remember.

To be anything other than embarrassing relegation fodder in the second division you need millions, tens of millions. Every season, so forget that lottery win dream – it would not be enough. Professional football is certifiably insane.

For me getting out of the fourth division is doable and something to aspire to and to look forward every season to have a go at. And it is enough. Yeah maybe we can have a bit of a cup run now and then which is hugely enjoyable and brings a few quid in and the chance to play some different teams. But trying to compete with them week in week out is hopeless. When that idiot Town director bragged at a fans forum that Town would be in the Championship in five years (four or five years ago) I just laughed. “Tell the fans what they wanna hear” he probably said in an aside to Mr Fenty.

Well my attitude is the opposite I am telling you what you don't want to hear. Like I wanted to tell that film director that casting Michelle Pfeiffer (probably the most beautiful woman in the world at the time) as a plain, dowdy, lovelorn waitress in Frankie and Johnnie was a really stupid idea. Not plausible, do not allow yourselves to dream too high. I am all for telling young folk to be the best they can be but I cannot support telling them you can be anything you want just because you want it. Call me an old spoilsport but I didn't get to go out with Michelle Pfeiffer - and that's probably a good thing because I bet that she doesn't like growing things or watching lower league football. I am off back out to plant some Romanescus out. See yer.