Cod Almighty | Match Report

by Tony Butcher

5 January 2025

So who's going to be the soggy Yorkshire puddings this lunchtime?

There's nigh on no wind in the trees and the cold sound of distant Mariners seeking a competitively priced car park in the air on a brittle, still, grumbling grey day of non-snow and non-ice.

Town lined up in insipid blue in the usual 4-1-4-1 if you're lucky formation as follows: Wright, Warren, Rodgers, McJannet, Hume, McEachran, Svanthorsson, Khouri, Davies, Barrington, Rose. The substitutes were Auton, Cass, Carson, Luker, Ainley, Wilson and Pyke. Ah, oh dear, in the grey of the morning had Dave's mind become confused. Warren and Barrington are many a Mariner's bad dream on the right, are we going to lose the fight? Are we going to wither at their height and weight advantage?

So many questions, so few answers. How do we solve the riddle of the stands? Let's get on with it before our feet fall off.

First half – A question of balance
Town kicked off away from the Town end.

Nothing.

Nothing but chips for 15 minutes. Chips down the side, chips into touch, chips that whipped, chips that dripped and chips onto shoulders that already have chips on 'em. C'mon, what did we ask for: no soggy chips. Well, we do have Wilson and Pyke on the bench.

A deep-fried chip after some skinny dipping past Bunny Warren and McJannet knock kneed a big-headed knock down barely over the bar. Is this the shape of things to come, will time make our men more wise? So many questions, so few answers. I wish we'd be bolder today.

Bradford big balls, their wing-backs a-hugging and chugging up the touchlines, forever chipping to the far post. So what? We're feeling kind of blue at these blue shorts billowing on the washing line. We're missing Green in blue already with some Freddie Freeloaders bouncing off big Bradford bottoms.

Frazzles and razzles, a corner cleared, a mixer stuck in and the unremarkably unmarked Kelly, standing alone, central and eight yards out. He rose, he headed and Wright plunged low to flip-flap off the line. Kids, screaming and scrambling in a paddling pool. Wright writhing, a time out called. Data scrunched, whiteboards wafting, fingers pointing, it's time for a chatathon and change.

Town stopped chipping artlessly down the sides and began the ever-popular Pepball Okey-Cokey. Artfully tippy-tapping inside their own area, between half-remembered names and faces, never ending or beginning, boxing themselves into the corners to be hugged and mugged by local youths roaming the streets.

Stretching and retching, an accordion bellows and nobody wants to hear that, do they? Bantams forever whirling round, like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel, sticking it to the far post for some bloke to rise above and beyond the feeble full-backs.

We're in their pocket, it's the story of the blues, bouncing off Bantams, less a solid formation more a string vest. Richards crept around the rear and flumbled at the far post. Over, wide, wide and over and crosses were crossed as for too long they roam. Is Barrington ever coming back to Warren's side to put it right? Is Svanthorsson a wraith or a winger?

McEachran felled most foully and a free kick far away. What do you expect? Wildebeest flowing across the Savannah? It's Town, of course, this was merely a springboard for a home attack. Off they sprung, Sarcevic flying solo down the middle. Wright waited, Wright watched, Wright stayed staunch, Wright blocked aside and Wright arose to magnificently parry Pointon's follow up flasher. Oh, so that's why we signed him. Nice to know.

Bradford won Town a corner. Town's short corner became a throw-in to Bradford. You could even hear the home smiles were returning to their faces as they felt Town's ice was slowly melting. Drip, drip, drip, they big dripped, we're but big drips. Kavanagh shimmered from afar, the ball skimming the turf as it made a bee-line for the bottom left corner. Wright flew low and left and out swooped his big right hand to shovel-scoop the ball back from behind his head.

Two minutes added. With the Wright stuff in goal at least we haven't conced… One last heave and another crossfield boomer to the bye-line. With Hume blocked off by Sarcevic, Halliday tickled and Baldwin big dripped to the far post. McEachran, still online booking his afternoon haircut, looked up, looked on and joined the full Town support in staring into space as Richards ambled around and volley-steered in from inside the six-yard box. George, you should have been in that space, but it's OK, George put his hand up and apologised.

Nothing had happened, except when it did. And if it did, it didn't involve any Town player except Wright, who had kept the score down in a dreary 0-0. Abysmally awful, frightfully fretful, Town were horribly holey, strangely sluggish, a collective shambles, individually inept and above all giving off the whiff of a team that considered their season's work complete.

Still, we all know the power of the half-time team talk, how this Town fight back after conceding.

Second half – I have been here before
No changes were made by either team at half time. Nothing changed for on Manningham's lower east side the early afternoon traffic is audible, as is the cry of the fishmongers…

Where Town had been holey and sluggish, now they were wholly rubbish. The Bradford bargeballers charged down the blue bumblers. Nibbles and noodles and McEachran passed back but passed to a stripe. George, you keep forgetting we aren't in stripes today. Swiftly rolled to their right Sarcevic was far too savvy, turning McJannet like an old blue sock on the bye-line and rolling over when he heard the faint, but building, sound of surf. When old Anton hears the sound of surf he always hits the turf, it's an inner ear thing as you age.

Of course the referee gave a penalty. Facts are not important, it is what you feel that is real and he feels love for the city of culture.

Wright went left, the ball went right. Officially Smallwood had scored. Unofficially? Smallwood had scored, facts are important, what you feel isn't.

Town knees are shakin' baby and we're being beaten like a drum. It feels like, it feels like this game's done. Poo-poo, poo-poo.

Poo-poo to you nay sayers and negative ninnies! That rumbling sound ain't your belly, it's the two stands of Town fans as Rose gave it some welly. A wallop from far and Walker flew left to spectacularly slap aside. Hume coiled to corner lowly, McJannet ducked at the near post and flicked a gently arcing header that slowly, slowly bedrooped over the standing Walker and perfectly into the far, unguarded side of the goal.

Davies's pot shot scrumbled off home toes and skipped into Walker's waiting hands. Spicy tackles and hackles rising...Khouri and Warren booked for legging up some passing legumes. As McEachran was dredged play was waved on and Pattison booked for complaining about a free kick not given to Town but then given only because he moaned. Nice to see the even-handed wayward whistling. Warren flew doubly in to cracking man-tackles, which is like the first cuckoo of spring, the natural precursor for him to be taken off. He was taken off.

On the hour Cass replaced Warren, five minute later Luker and Ainley replaced McEachran and Barrington. This did not make Town any worse.

Kavanagh wriggled and rolled wide into the side netting, a home header wide, a scramble of hacks as Town were brushed back and back, as Bradford ground on and on prodding the flabby flanks and mugging in midfield. Town were fading, fading, fading, losing their religion. Did they even have one?

I thought I could hear them laughing, I thought I could hear them sing.

Somewhere, some place, nowhere much, slack-thighed Svanthorsson, the wilting waltzing waif, feyly fumble-stumbled back to a Bantam. Pattison rumbled forward, slaloming past a couple of wet blankets, bedraggled a roll across Wright from the 'D' and the ball boinked off the right post into the left side of the netting.

The game's gone. As, in a trickle as slow as the wits in the Town team, are the more recherché Town fans. It's all slowly seeping away.

A scramble at a corner, another this, another that as more Marooners marauded and rolled wide, whacked wide, passed wide and headed wide. It's over, it's over, it's over for Svanthorsson and the unusually enervated Evan. On came Dad's Army.

Yeah, whatever, a Rose overhead drifted wide, a Wilson flick was the last flickering of a dying light. Five minutes were added. It's the fourth division, it's only Grimsby Town. Hey Bradfordians, you're laughing this time, next time you might be the one.

Three away games in a row Town have lost and conceded three. Whatever Accrington was this wasn't, for this was as wretched, pathetic and listless as Swindon, with as much fight, determination and general grit as that capitulation. The difference only that three times more of us were there to witness it. More of us made more of an effort than this lot and that is what stings more. It is not something that can be written off as a one-off, a bad day at the office, this is increasingly the norm, it is the office.

Town: lost in situations, circumstances, miscommunications and, I have to say, by the way, we just may like some explanations. Big city, wrong choices.

Three more wins.