Cod Almighty | Diary

Happy Ian Day

26 July 2024

As mentioned in yesterday's diary regarding the 21st Century XI compiled by View From The Findus, the omission of Alan Connell feels harsh but understandable given the impact of Reddy and McAtee either side of Connell's two periods at the club (the second barely counts, I know), and that they were not just goal scorers but wonderfully entertaining footballers too.

Today, however, I'm going to argue to kick one of them out, not for Connell but for Padraig Amond. Firstly, your A46 Diary is declaring Ian Day. Let me explain, leaving out Amond is like an Arsenal or Liverpool fan leaving out their Ians, Wright and Rush, two chaps who come closest to that rarest of almost-guarantees: goals.

In this century, and arguably the final couple of decades of the last (at least, post-Drinkell), Amond is the closest we've come to that guarantee. Mendonca, Lester and Boulding were all great, and would move a shade ahead of him in an all-time 11 but again, this is because of that entertainment factor; wonderful footballers make for a wonderful experience, and Amond was never a wonderful footballer. Never fast, never particularly skilful, not tall, not particularly strong, a bustler rather than a trotter who just ran the channels, didn't seem to do anything out of the ordinary, and yet, when the ball was in the box, he was that fox that we'd been crying out for for so many years.

And the joy he took in playing, working those channels, scoring those goals, it was infectious, as if he more than anyone picked us up after the trauma of the play-off final in 2015. If ever there was a player who captured the feeling of right place, right time, not just on the pitch but throughout the whole of that season, then it was our little Irish wizard. He terrorised the opposition, making space for himself, drawing all the focus and allowing Disley and Bogle and Arnold to arrive in the box. He was a wonder even if he wasn't wonderful.

So, who's out? It's Reddy. McAtee was also right place, right time, a forever legend, a real Town player and someone to share with my kids, their first player of real quality. My eldest was born in the season Reddy signed and he was almost called Michael, but he can't remember him (his earliest memory is Louis Soares, a player he called the roly poly man because he could never stay on his feet) and that time means nothing to anyone under the age of 25. Lucky them, we might say because, ultimately, Reddy played in a failing team, and, besides, he always looked on the verge of another injury while Amond was the scruffy mongrel who bustled past the long line of pedigree trotters at the vets.

Amond, like McAtee, is the face of success, the broad shoulders that carried us to our own sunlit uplands.

And if that's not enough, then May 2016 in Peterborough services and that song not just echoing but thundering throughout, filling the WH Smiths and the Marks and Spencer's, making stationery and Percy Pigs rumble and rattle with joy. If football is about moments and memories then Amond has given us more than Michael Reddy. So, Amond is our 21st Century Ian. Happy Ian Day.