Cod Almighty | Match Report

by Tony Butcher

9 May 2023

They say revolution's in the air. I say it's raining.

Talk about a month of Sundays. It's been a toffee-nosed wet weekend as far as I can see. We're here, we're finally here, the end of the pier show at the end of a two-year cycle of churning and gurning. Everything is beautiful in its own way, and the only thing we have to complain about is that there's nothing much to complain about.

Ah, the tedium of a safe and sound life by the sea. It's like we've prematurely retired to a bungalow down North Sea Lane where the only thing to look forward to is the past. And a trip to Pennell's for an unsatisfactory overpriced muffin and a tut or two at the tat in the garden ornaments section.

Just one more cup of coffee before bedtime.

Town lined up in a 3-4-2-1 formation as follows: Crocombe, Smith, Pearson, Maher, Emmanuel, Hunt, Khouri, Glennon, Clifton, Lloyd and Orsi. The substitutes were Efete, Waterfall, Holohan, Green, O'Neill, Khan and Taylor. Hey diddle-diddle, who's the piggy in the middle? Why, Little Alex of course. And there'll be no trouble with Harry as Pell's at home dancing in his underwear and I don't care.

I'd like to go to sleep now, please.

1st half – Living in hope
The Wimbles kicked off away from their 367 slumbering day trippers and towards the Pontoon. A roar as Pearson soared and slip-slidey headed backwards. They fell over. They fell over again.

Who's been watching Ted Lasso then?

Total triangles! Teasing, pleasing and easing through the wooziness. Lloyd snickled after being tickled, Little Harry hassled and Hunt hunted down some loitering litter pickers. Smith swept across, Maher mashed into the covered corner and Orsi-Orsi chased. Orsi-Orsi turned and Orsi-Orsi crossed from the narrowest of bye-lines. Ogundere turned his face from the crowd and toe-ended loopily over the flapping Broome, against the farthest post…and the ball tinkled in.

What a nice way to interrupt our lunchtime snooze.

Passing. Movement. A reverie of rotating roulades, a rotisserie of Wombles, a sense of fun. Orsi almosted, Broome plopped. Hunt here, there and everywhere. Nobody can deny that there's something there.

Ah, there running his hands through his hair. Is he or isn't he? Davison, their flabby Andy Carroll, almost certainly uses Harmony hairspray. I know you know what you know but you should know by now that he's not even Orsi. Danny boy has far better teeth. Maher blocked their Pearson. He was offside. So what.

Yeah, big man walking in the park. Smith surged through the blue meanies but Khouri knock-knock-knock-kneed at the door as the long black cloud is comin' down. Lloyd headed off with a head hurt, returning as the eggman, and Hunt lay down upon the turf, slain by dragons. Here they all are getting a tan from standing in the English rain.

And after 25 minutes the game ended as the mirage of a spectacle. Little Harry sat down and stroked his shins, stroked his chin and on came Holohan. We'll always have Shaun Pearson's head.

Bibbling and bobbling and a blue swipe hit the eggman, ballooning back to the whitest teeth in football. Alas time waits for no man.

Alas. Alack. Al Bowlly was a popular vocalist and jazz guitarist in the 1930s. Hey, we may as well use the time to expand your general knowledge. Poor Al, killed by a Luftwaffe parachute mine. He could have been bigger than Bing Crosby if he'd survived the war.

We should have brought a toy to the last day at school. We stared at the walls waiting for the dinner bell.

Their fat Andy was booked after triple trickery into the Town box and an unhappy slippy ending. They, that is Wombledon, moved their bodies towards the Pontoon. They really shouldn't have bothered. Why? Because the world is round and Shaun Pearson can head the ball. Shaun Pearson headed the ball. Again. And again. And again.

Pearson nosed the ball away, Pearson chinned the ball away, Pearson received a standing ovation for every breath and every move he made.

Four fun-filled minutes were added. Pearson kept heading away. For fun.

Does it really matter so long as you're having fun?

2nd half – We love you
Neither team made any changes at half time.

What good is sitting all alone in your room? Come hear the music play, come to the cabaret. Pressure, piddling, blocks in black. Simply choose your Town player's toes. Or Shaun Pearson's head.

Harmony Hairspray flibbled from afar, Crocombe dealt with matters. Ringo passed across the penalty area straight to the Wimbledon wobblebottom. You have nothing to fear but fear itself.

Hunt dwibbled wide. There is nothing more to say.

Halfway through the half the world was given the moment it craved, the money shot if you will, as Shaun Pearson walked off to receive his lifetime achievement Oscar. The referee applauded, Woodyard shook the hand of a codgod and Otis Khan shuffled past, barely noticed as throats were cleared and eyes were dried. This is not the end, this is not even the beginning of the end, this is just, perhaps, the end of his beginning.

Crosstown trafficking, a Khan flick, a Ringo overlap, Holohan stretched and missed, bimbling and bumbling, Lloyd slashed, Khouri burned as blue bed blockers arrived to spoil the party.

Khan bubbling, Khan buzzing, Khan chipping and Orsi rising afar, but two yards out. A Wombler leant gently against the soaring striker and Danny Boy grazed backwards, clearing beautifully.

Can't we just go home now, what's the point of carrying on?

Emmanuel, Lloyd and Khouri were replaced by O'Neill, Green and Efete as Town moved to a 4-3-3 formation. There you are, a fact, a straight fact. No weird allusion to Englebert Humperdinck or mash-up of Voltaire and Timmy Mallet, just the way it was.

Khan drifted, drifted, drifted and spun, spun and drifted, waltzed and curtseyed, twisted and caressed a gentle curler. The ball ambled through and around a blurrage of blue legs and Broome finger-flipped away from the foot of his left post. Holohan swooped on the swipe but blooming Broome zoomed across to duvet and divert.

They should have had two penalties. They didn't get them. Does it really matter? Other things didn't happen, often. Pinball dizzery as sun loungers loomed large in the frontal lobes.

Four minutes were added, Broome hared out of his area and wellied into the shadowlands below the Frozen Horsebeer Stand. Big bloke Bartley blasted over the stands and far, far away.

Put down the knitting, the book and the broom. It's time for a holiday.

And so to sleep.