Cod Almighty | Article
by Mat Hare
23 May 2006
After Cheltenham's local paper the Gloucestershire Echo produced a magnificent A-Z of Grimsby to give them a quick lowdown on us, we took it upon ourselves to reciprocate. Well, Mat did. And this is his A-Z of Cheltenham, in loving homage to the original.
A is for a football club: Cheltenham Town are one, and have been for a while now. A is also for Andy Gray: the Sky Sports pundit once played for the club.
B is for ball: Cheltenham players have been seen kicking one of these, although the exact reasoning behind this is unclear. B is also for book: Steve Book holds the record for most appearances for the club with 159 to date. Which, of course, is nothing compared to Macca's record but bless Steve for trying.
C is for sea: Cheltenham isn't very near one. C is also for Christmas: the Robins is the nickname of Cheltenham and you don't get much more Christmassy than that. Apart from Santa Claus, presents, turkey and the little baby Jesus, of course.
D is for dogs: the population of Cheltenham and the surrounding areas have tamed these beasts and keep them as pets. Some are also rumoured to keep cats. D is also for Debbie: there are two of them on the club's management team, one running the club shop and the other is the commercial sales executive.
E is for Eddie 'The Eagle' Edwards, who claims the town as his birthplace. There's something for both Mr Edwards and the town to be proud of, eh? E is also for egg-chasing, as the locals care a lot more about rugby than they do about football. Freaks.
F is for Friday, because for some weird reason we always end up playing these buggers on Friday nights. F is also for Finnigan, the surname of Cheltenham Town's skipper. He is only distantly related to queen of daytime TV Judy Finnigan. He thinks Richard Madeley tries too hard to be down with the kids.
G is for Gloucestershire. Cheltenham is in Gloucestershire. G is also for GCHQ, the government agency for spying on people and reading all their emails and stuff, which is based in the town. They also listened in on all the dirty phone calls you have been making recently and are building a file on you. Perv.
H is for horse racing: let's face it, that's what Cheltenham is actually famous for. The fact they have a football team is pretty insignificant to most of the local population. H is also for Holst - the Planets composer was from Cheltenham, apparently. I never knew that! Cor!
I is for 'I spy' - recently voted the most popular game to play on car journeys through Gloucestershire by AA members for the fourth year running. I is also for Ireland. Cheltenham is much nearer Ireland than Grimsby is.
J is for jumpers: 37 per cent of the population bought some form of knitted garment to be worn on the upper body in the past 12 months. J is also for jam: strawberry jam is the region's second most popular toast topping behind cheese, but we already had C covered.
K is for Kayode Odejayi: the Nigerian fella is about the only thing I can find beginning with K, so had I been doing this back in April of 2003 or before, I would have been stuffed, since he wouldn't have been at the club. Then I would have had to have made something up about kites, kissing or Kit Kats.
L is for ladies: there is a ladies' college in the town of Cheltenham, imaginatively called Cheltenham Ladies' College. That name must have taken ages to think up. It's one of the top 50 public schools in the UK though. L is also for left: if you look at a map of England Cheltenham is part way up on the left-hand side.
M is for mortgages. I looked at what Cheltenham & Gloucester had to offer last summer when I needed a mortgage but went with the Nationwide instead. Although I did quite like one of the mortgages Abbey had on offer.
N is for National Hunt, the code of horse racing on offer at Cheltenham racecourse, with the Cheltenham festival one of the most famous national hunt events of the season. N is also for nightlife: according to the websites I have been looking on, there doesn't seem to be a great deal of it in Cheltenham.
O is for Oldham, which ends in 'ham', just like Cheltenham. And Dagenham. But not Redbridge. It is not known how much pig farmers paid for the town sponsorship deal, and rumours that the beef marketing board are in negotiations with Cheltenham to change the town name to Cheltenbeef are unconfirmed.
P is for players: Cheltenham Town have recently been relying on these to score points in the league. Hey, points begins with P too. Fancy that. P is also for passing, something the players do with the ball.
Q is for quite hard. I honestly thought this alphabet would be a lot easier to do than it is proving to be. Q is also for quick: I expected it to be a quick job but it's not.
R is for Robins, their nickname. They are not the only Robins in the league though, with Swindon Town and Bristol City sharing the nickname. However, it is believed that Cheltenham got their nickname after Robin Askwith approached them with a proposal to film Confessions of a Football Player at Whaddon Road in the 1970s.
S is for spa: Cheltenham is a spa town, which means there are more mini-marts and convenience stores per head there than in 95 per cent of other UK towns. This means that the locals are never short of a place to buy Hob Nobs and booze.
T is for Trinity Church, the largest Anglican church outside of That London. T is also for twin towns, which include Cheltenham in Pennsylvania, USA.
U is for UCAS: the clearing house for UK university and college applications is based in Cheltenham. U is also for university: the University of Gloucestershire has its main campus there. They probably teach a lot of stuff about farming.
V is for visitors: apparently Cheltenham is a really nice place to visit, according to the website of the local tourist board, but then they would say that wouldn't they? V is also for Victory: Jamie Victory seems to have made a load of appearances for the club, more than Steve Book who Soccerbase reckons holds the record for club appearances. Which means my entry for B was bollocks.
W is for Whaddon Road, the name of Cheltenham Town's ground. W is also for west, since Cheltenham is in the west. W can also be for Wales. Cheltenham must be bloody close to Wales by the looks of it.
X is for x-ray: someone at Cheltenham must have had one once. X is also for xylophone, which apparently Grant McCann is dead good at playing.
Y is for youth team: Cheltenham's youth team didn't win the Midlands Floodlit Cup this season. I don't know if they entered, to be honest, but they might have done.
Z is for zoo: there is one in Bristol, which is only just down the road really. And it has penguins, seals, lions, monkeys, gorillas and an insect house so it has to be worth a visit.