Cod Almighty | Diary

It's traditional

24 December 2024

The last time Christmas Eve fell on a Saturday, two years ago, there were no Football League fixtures. It was not always thus: in the years before floodlights, Saturdays were too precious to waste, so they added to a crowded holiday fixture list.

A great Grimsby tradition was established on 24 December 1921, when Jimmy Carmichael was selected at centre forward. Although he'd played a few games in the position before, Town's management saw him mainly as a centre half or an inside right. However, the local press were reflecting a growing clamour that Carmichael should regularly lead the attack, so when he scored all Town's goals in a 4-1 win over Halifax there was a rousing chorus of "I told you so". Over the next 15 years, Carmichael was followed by Joe Robson, Tim Coleman and Pat Glover, and the football world marvelled at the Fishermen's knack for conjuring up great centre forwards for negligible fees.

It is a myth that only Grimsby and Hull were allowed to host matches on Christmas Day itself, a distortion with origins in a kernel of truth. The Football League, after setting the fixture list for all the Saturday matches, decided only how teams should be paired for three sets of mid-week games, to be arranged for early in the season, when the evenings were still light, over Easter, and at Christmas. They left the clubs to finalise the precise dates themselves. As the Grimsby fish market did not open on Good Friday or Christmas Day, they offered a rare free day for people who worked on Saturday afternoon, giving Town the chance to draw a big crowd. As their visitors would take a share of the gate money, they generally let Grimsby play those games at home.

Over Easter there were usually three matches in four days, and there were consecutive fixtures on Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Christmas Day fell on a Thursday in 1929, so Grimsby played three matches in a row. Not one of them added a jot to festive spirits.

On Christmas morning they drew 0-0 draw against Liverpool. It was so lacking in interest that when spectators finally raised a cheer in the 70th minute, it was more out of a desire to amuse themselves than from any genuine excitement. Next day, the same sides drew again at Anfield. Notices around the ground reminded fans to behave; they did not deter someone from throwing a clinker of fused brick material at the Grimsby goalkeeper, and there were cheers when our centre forward, Tim Coleman, was injured and unable to continue. Grimsby had no time to call up a replacement so next day the outside left, Billy Marshall, led Town's attack in a 5-0 defeat by Chelsea.

The tradition of Christmas Day fixtures ebbed away in the early 1960s. A decade later, Ron Noades tried to revive them for whichever of the London clubs he was exerting his baleful influence over at the time, claiming it would be ideal as dads and lads could watch the game while the mums prepared their dinner. There is no record of whether Noades was ever introduced to a feminist, a sportswoman, or any human being half-way to enlightenment.

Noades acts as a useful reminder that some traditions - blacking up, fox hunting, and Town failing to show up when their their fans most want them to win - deserve to die. On the other hand, Newbegin Diary hopes that there will always be a place for filling out topical blogs with historical jottings.

Merry Christmas.