Cod Almighty | Diary

Dave Moore’s Aqua Aerobics? Bring it on!

18 July 2023

I mentioned last week that I hadn't managed to get to any of Town's pre-season friendlies but that I was going to see Notts County v Forest at the weekend. As ever, there is very little that you can read into a friendly game but with players keen to make an impression on the manager, you expect them to try a few things. It was an easy one-nil victory to Forest who didn't get out of second gear, despite fielding many youngsters and players who had been out on loan last season. County seemed full of energy for about the first 15 minutes but then ran out of ideas and puff. I'm just hoping that's the case when we play them in August. We can but wish!

The Fair Game Index was published yesterday. Every football club in the Premier League and the Football League are ranked on four criteria set out in the original Fan-Led Review:

• Financial Sustainability
• Good Governance
• Fan Engagement
• Equality Standards

In the fourth tier Town were ranked ninth out of the twenty-four teams. The average score in our league was 40.2 with Town coming in at 44.19. However, most of the "Fan Engagement" score came from a survey undertaken during the previous season where Town scored nothing as we were non-league. Hopefully that will look better next year. Eighty "touchpoints" are mentioned as to how all the scores are derived but only the Financial Sustainability criteria is explained in detail. It is also given the highest weighting of the categories. That does make sense, given the parlous state of the finances of some clubs but it would be good to know what is included in other areas. It would be nice to think this index will make a difference to how the game is run but it's probably wishful thinking. We shall see.

One thing I found interesting, since the Premier League was created in 1992, there have been 64 instances of clubs collapsing into administration in the top four divisions. Admittedly some clubs then pull back from the brink but that is a far higher number than I would have guessed. Not a great advert for how our game is run.

The squad has headed abroad. The friendly against Port Vale will now kick off an hour earlier due to the heatwave in Europe. Don't run around too much lads. Alicante will be around 34 degrees today rising to 38 tomorrow, but hopefully sense will prevail and the most strenuous activity for the players will be a bit of aqua-aerobics. I can see Dave Moore leading that one, not!

UTM!