Cod Almighty | Diary

Bad habits make our decisions for us

8 September 2023

I miss John Fenty. Diarists in years gone by simply had to look back through his announcements and pronouncements, squeeze out the juice and serve cold. These days we have to dig a little deeper. Yelp.

Tomorrow we play Bradford, or the Bradawls as they like to be called, kicking off at 1230hrs so the telly people can get us out of the way early. It’s not like me to feel sorry for opposition fans, I’m really not part of the big happy family of football. But every time we play them I have to point out how disheartening it must be to have a big ground with regular large crowds and still find yourself consistently below Accrington Stanley in the league table. I know nothing of the club’s ownership and politics, but I’d bet a pound or two it's run by the kind of circus clowns we put up with for so long.

They are managed by ex-Man Utd and Wales soccer superstar Mark Hughes. It is possible, but admittedly not likely, that we may have a reader too young to have seen Hughes play. All you need to know is that he always had the demeanour of a man who would rather be cleaning out a nightclub toilet on a Sunday morning than playing football, and doubtless brings the same grinch de vivre to managing a bunch of underperforming division four footballers.

We have two ex-Bradawls in the side, one of whom scores the same goal every week and another who started disappointingly and then got injured. That’s your riddle for today. Answers on a postcard please, but don’t bother sending them in. I’m busy. Ta.

The Bradawls are short of confidence and the natives are restless, which means it will go one of two ways. Either they will beat us easily, since Town teams in recent years have been a godsend for teams on a poor run of form, or we will beat them and the Grimsby Reaper will descend on the drizzly Welshman and put him out of his misery. Their problem has been scoring goals and due to injuries they have only one player in their squad tomorrow who has scored a league goal this season. Not only is Andy Cook out but his deputy is too. For the record, I would like to point out that I didn’t shoot either of them.

There, that’s Bradford dealt with.

Where do you get your Town news these days? Our young reader, if he/she exists, will not remember a time when news sources were few and far between and everyone basically got the same information at the same time. I haven’t used the Telegraph for years, since Mrs BOTB banned it from the house for making pariahs of poor people on the breadline for getting an extra £20 a week out of the benefits, whilst studiously ignoring any crime, corruption or fraud going on amongst the richer and more influential layers of local society.

Since the banning decision was made, the paper has somehow managed to go downhill. Check out, if you have a strong stomach, the front pages from Monday and Wednesday this week. Both are essentially local residents complaining bitterly about the fact that there is greenery with nature and wildlife near their houses. One described a field - a field! - as an 'eyesore', and the Telegraph described it as 'derelict' even though there were never any buildings on it. Another resident said it was 'bad for his mental health' having to see green plants and not the abattoir or Asda’s car park he was presumably hoping for.

Wednesday’s edition featured an unintentionally hilarious picture of a woman pointing proudly at her huge bare fence and looking appalled that there was ivy growing over the top of it. Now, naturephobic people like this exist in every town. A friend of mine who is a warden at a nature reserve was once told by a member of the public that his reserve was full of weeds and needed tidying up, but why the Telegraph thought they were worth giving front pages to I can’t imagine. Actually, I can imagine, but this is a Town diary, so back to that.

Now that everyone has a phone – even one of the more reactionary CA stalwarts has sold his flip phone to the local antiques centre and joined the 21st century – news dissemination has become more disjointed. Personally I hear more rumours, truths and nonsense from various Whatsapp groups, websites and individuals than I can handle. This leads to a kind of information fatigue.

I only really believe a player has signed for us when I’ve seen him play in at least four games. Do other towns suffer as badly from 'muppets making shit up syndrome'? They always act as though a friend of a friend of a friend has privileged information and can assure you that Geoffrey from Rainbow, or whoever, is taking over the club and bringing in Wendy Craig as manager. God’s honest truth, mate.

Why do they do this? Has their mental health been adversely affected by seeing a tree? I just don’t get it. One of the upsides of the stability we are currently experiencing is that its giving these weird fabricators less opportunities to bullshit. Perhaps if you ever made up a transfer rumour in the deep and distant past you can write in and tell us why you did it. Fame? Notoriety? Shits and giggles? Clicks? Thrills?

Whatever. We will of course be taking a Mighty Town Army to Delius’s birthplace tomorrow, and best of luck to all of you and the team.

UTFM, as always, and play up Grimsby!