Cod Almighty | Diary

Only a fool would say that

4 March 2024

Miss Guest Diary writes: How did you celebrate Town's win on Saturday? I got a Chinese takeaway and watched a recording of Dorking Wanderers vs Chesterfield. I did experience a slight tinge of regret that, now we've climbed to the heady heights of 21st with a six-point cushion and a game in hand, I probably won't see Town play at the Meadowbank ground – something I had been looking forward to before the giddy play-off campaign of 2022.

Unfortunately, there are always a few people who seem incapable of celebrating, even when they get what they asked for. Why is it that they are unable to take joy from a positive outcome and look always for the negatives? Is it a matter of age, geography or gender, or something else? I'm willing to bet that, to a man, they'd had a conversation before the game about not caring how Town played just as long as they got the three points. Those three points were barely in the bag before some took to Twitter to criticise the performance and some of the individual players.

Of course, we were all happy that Town had won and most acknowledged that they didn't care how the team had managed it, but the miserable few just couldn't leave it there. Seeing the game described as "abysmal" and "appalling" with Town "playing poorly" and "the poorest we've been in a while" is depressing. Friends sat around me in the Pontoon were complaining about the quality of the football. What were they expecting? Two teams struggling at the bottom of the fourth division to put on a display like Man City vs Arsenal or Liverpool vs AC Milan? If we'd had a few more "appalling" 1-0s this season we might be looking up towards the play-off places rather than down at the prospect of relegation.

I make no apology for saying I enjoy games like Saturday's. Scoring the early goal was pleasing and getting a couple more would have eased everyone's nerves, but the tension invoked by hanging on for the rest of the game was gripping. Every good tackle, every desperate intervention called forth applause from the crowd. It would be nice if some of Town's players could manage to kick the ball more than three yards when trying to clear it from our box, but that only added to the excitement. I concede that it was not high quality football, but it was never boring – which is more than can be said for some of the tippy-tappy passing games played by teams higher up the football pyramid.

With four points from the last two games it feels like we might have turned a corner; if we can get four points from the next two at Wimbledon and Sutton, then I think we can uncross our fingers and start to look forward to another season in the football league.

See you in south London.

UTM