Cod Almighty | Diary

Home again and feeling right

23 September 2024

Miss Guest Diary writes: You know, I was sorely tempted to simply re-publish Friday's A46 diary today. It so perfectly captured the Blundell Park experience for fans of all generations and garnered such praise from the Twitterati that today feels like the very definition of coming after the Lord Mayor's Show.

I'm now pondering how many, especially younger, people appreciate the meaning and origin of that frequently-used expression. I have a head start on most of you because, as my mother often used to tell me, I was born on Lord Mayor's Show Day. Why was this significant to her? I guess growing up in London in the 1920s before the advent of TV the annual Lord Mayor's parade must have been a big deal. Maybe you not only have to be senior in years but you have to come from London too to get it.

Anyway, back to Town. They managed to beat Bromley in the 'must win' game on Saturday. Really? Must win games in September? I'm with Guest Diary in deploring this new phenomenon. One of the residents of CA Towers always maintains that the season doesn't start till March and I'm inclined to agree. So I'm designating Cheltenham away as the point when we can start talking about 'must win' games.

And now there's people agonising on Twitter about Town not winning back-to-back league games since…ooh, 18 months ago. The league is set up so that, mostly, home and away games alternate; teams are expected to win their home games and wins away from home are harder to come by. So why is this 'record' preoccupying some folk? I blame our years in the Bananarama, when away wins were much more frequent. Just relax – we've already won two games in a row this season – Bradford in the league cup and Cheltenham in the league. Those worriers need to forget about all bogus records and just enjoy the journey.

David Artell was once more complaining in his post-match interview on Saturday about the inconsistency of referees, and I think he has a point. Let's look at the evidence: Bromley committed 13 fouls and received one yellow card; Town committed 9 fouls and received 4 yellow cards. Looking back to last week's game against Barrow, both teams received three yellow cards, but Barrow committed nearly twice as many fouls – 15 to Town's nine. Well that speaks for itself really, doesn't it.

Fortunately it didn't stop Town winning the 'must win' game against Bromley, but on another occasion it might have. We're all aware of the controversy surrounding the refereeing decisions in the recent Notts County game. I'm not saying County didn't deserve the victory – they undoubtedly played much better than Town on the night – but who's to say what effect being gifted two goals in the first 15 minutes had on the performance of both teams. At the very least it would have dented the confidence of one and boosted that of the other.

You win some, you lose some and you can draw your own conclusions from what was just another game. We'll be back, we always are. It's called home for a reason.

UTM