Cod Almighty | Article

by Tony Butcher

15 October 2024

The best thing to come out of H-h-h-h-h-h-hull since a tube of toothpaste. A player with a penchant for plonking free kicks over wobbly walls and popping ‘em into the top corner. Now much older than he was and now and again a perennial Premier League reserve, when Conor Townsend walked into our lives you could see the chemistry, for we all must agree that together it was beautiful while it lasted.

Young Conor Stephen Townsend is 6 foot tall, Hessle-born and played 43 games for Town during 2011/12 and 2015, scoring three goals. He basically played a season.

Yes, he played for a staggered year on his journey of discovery that led to the promised land. We were a useful toilet break on his way to the top, does he remember his first flush of football? Of course he does, he played for Town!

That's numbers, just dates and facts, they tell you of nothing but an existence, of days when our existence was low, when somehow we couldn't break away from the doldrums.

Do you remember his first time? We can remember a worse time, but we've changed so much since then. So long ago, was it all a dream? What do we remember? A rangy runner with a wicked whipping, dipping cross on him. Signed to replace Lee Ridley whilst the injured Jamie Green pondered a short-term contract offer, Townsend was a silky counterpoint to Gary Silk.

He took a cracking free kick you know.

Our match reports are a variation on a theme: Townsend crinkled crosses, swerved and swayed and dipped and dripped, sometimes fizzing flatly, occasionally tickling and teasing. He surged and splurged as one would do if you had the Serge of Makofo in front of you, but on a bad day those long curls from Townsend would be flying downwind and out of sight.

Now don't you go away thinking Town were one-dimensional in those far off days of Shouty and Shorty. No, no, no, they had a second string to their one-dimensional bow – Townsend's spearing searing whacking free kicks, which sometimes dropped on Duffy's or Pearson's bonce. Sorry, you'd forgotten about fluffy Duffy hadn't you, but this series is all about context and perspective. Townsend was too good to be forgotten in a pretty dire team.

Ah yes, you want to remember the first time don't you, the debut in the fourth Qualifying Round of the FA Cup, the coalminer's slaughter of Ashington and an immediate impact. Four minutes in the silk came out of the purse as "Townsend whirled his arms and struck a power chord, spoondling a huge drooping, drifting cross that died several times above the roofs and houses as a rainbow climbed high over Spurn Point. The ball coiled backwards and away from goal as the keeper chased the lucky lady. Duffy stood still and allowed the ball to hit his head and slowly, sorrowfully skulk into the empty net. The fishy was on the dishy even before Town's boat had floated."

Sorry, Duffy again. It's therapeutic to remember the ropeyness of yore.

Amidst the arcing crosses and aching runs there were the free kicks. And goals. Well, a couple. Ah, those free kicks. A beautiful left foot, a cultured left foot, his left foot was so, so sweet.

He took a cracking free kick you know.

An opening goal but in open play against Hornchuch in the FA Trophy "… receiving the ball in the land beyond the shadow of the Findus with a purple nutmeg and sexy sway, two grown men were removed from history. Fifteen yards out and Townsend opened his body coiling a right-footed shot around and across the keeper"

An adequate right foot too. Don't forget even your average professional footballer has two feet.

We're teasing you with album tracks, you want the hits!

Let's wax lyrically about those free kicks, the champagne moments of a brief sojourn the right side of the right side of the Humber. Forest Green in 2012: "A wall started to coalesce in strict order of height, smallest on the left, tallest on the right. Winn and Townsend stood above the ball and pondered ponderously. Russell crouched behind the wall, unsighted. Townsend took a couple of steps and carefully coiled over the third smallest man on the pitch into the leftist of left sides of the goal."

Music and fashion were always their passion and at the end of the day, Barry, this was the day the sponsors fell in love as Townsend became their go-to plonk-popper.

When he returned in 2015 he had more fitness and finesse and was found to be finagling fabulously with a lovely new haircut; a short term boost for a team coalescing into a promotion cracker. Rich Mills purred as he sipped Martinis on the English Riviera "You don't get many footballing full-backs in the Conference."

You don't get too many fantastic free kick specialists in the Conference, Rich.

Another FA Cup minnow slaying with Omar, Omar, Omar Bogle falling over around the 'D'. Townsend adjusted his theodolite to account for the curvature of the Earth and swanked a big dripper into the top right corner.

Fly forward a month and other free kick flies into the net as Welling are walloped. Arnold and Townsend whispered sweet nothings behind fashionably hidden hands. The keeper stood in perfect isolation behind his wall, waiting for Arnold's in-swinger to worm its way goalwards. As everyone waited for the demon barber's cut and trim, Townsend did the shake and vac, arcing a swerving, swishing dream inside the top left corner, the ball smooching against the middle of the net. The Pontoon purred at the parabolic perfection.

That would have been a perfect ending, but it all ended on 29 December 2015 at home against a feeble set of Imps. Four minutes into the second half Townsend waved his arms and hobbled off, taking the moment to linger and give panoramic slo-mo applause to every person in the ground.

Conor Townsend made us forget our marbles and maybe we've forgotten that all his best bits were in advancing and attacking. Conor Townsend: a very modern full-back from modern times in an old-fashioned meat and potatoes team.

Thank you young man, glad to be of assistance. You took a cracking free kick.

Illustration courtesy of Alex Chilvers