Cod Almighty | Match Report

by Tony Butcher

28 November 2025

Well here we are again, again as overhead an albatross hangs motionless upon the November air, hovering over the Humber, taunting Town. Deep beneath the rolling waves of indifference, down in the labyrinths of the Incontinence Pad Stand, Big Dave seeks salvation but remember: Thursday's child has far to go.

And for the miserable Merseybeaters that's literally true, mate. Thursday football, an abomination, it's time Town turned domination into non-defeats.

Town lined up in a 4-1-4-1 formation as follows: Pym, Rodgers, Warren, McJannet, Staunton, Turi, Burns, Walker, Khouri, Vernam and Rose. The substitutes were Casper, Ecclestone, Oduor, the artist still known as Amaluzor, Gilsenan, Soonsup-Bell and Kabia. No Greenery today. Well, it is November, what do you expect? Ah, he's injured, we're left with a six twigs and a sapling on the bench and the second string midfield. Ah, yes, I forgot, we've got depth this year. Indeed, we have been exploring the depths recently.

Tranmere, a bunch of names, just a long list of Christian names and Kristian Dennis. Any old ex-Mariners? Of course, it's obligatory, to collect a bunch of flowers that were rotten in our borough, blooming beyond the county lines. With a defence containing Joseph Norman Smith we have to wonder: are they habitual criminals? One can only hope they defend in a casual manner, or at least be as wishy-washy as their kit.

Does anyone really want to be here?

1st half – The angry silence
Town kicked off towards the Pontoon, away from 231 travelling Tranpeople, a smorgasbord of semi-Scousery housed in the covered corner.

Silence.

Stripes sleepwalking, the crowd not even indulging in small-talking to pass the time. To pass, to pass, Turi to pass, to pass to Turi, Turi to pass, to pass to Warren to McJannet, to Warren, to pass, to pass, to hoof on the roof. Where's the proof? It's in the pudding; this is a stodgy pudding in need of some sprucing. Got any custard?

No-one moved, no-one cutting the mustard. Two teams rusted up before winter sets in.

They had a cross once. Town had an attack, twice. Rodgers ducked, a blue boot flicked and Harvey was in a heap inside their penalty area. The ref saw no slips, but stopped play anyway for treatment. And ordered Harrumphing Harvey off for half a minute.

To pass, to pass, to pass out. Are we there yet?

A Town cross and extremely mild peril as a blue head flobbled, Turi lobbled and Murphy's flaw was exposed in the light. Old Joe flap-slapped sideways, straight to Burns. The goal agaped for a moment, but our Irish rover swiffled betwixt and between, neither a shot nor cross, bisecting and dissecting the defenders and a vaguely lurking Vernam as it ambled across the face of goal.

Town, as insipid as the Tranmere shirts, were ragged and it's not funny as they passed from side to side to side to side and finally into the ozone.

A limpid light blue lump to their left and Ironside grazed on. Whitaker waffled around a Turi wiffle and, from the right cornerish of the penalty area, carefully caressed a slow, low rollerball that ached through various legs beyond the shrinking Pym and into the bottom left corner. Eventually. It was barely a back pass, let alone a shot, but the bare facts are that barely anything had happened to scare the pigeons.

Warren's two-footed scrape resulted in a free kick, dead centre, right on the edge of the penalty area. Wall. We had one. The ball went into the wall and that's all there is to it.

What else is there to it?

Vernam piffled pathetically oncely, twicely, this is not going nicely. There's an ill wind blowing through the Pontoon causing a right stink and makes you think – why are we here? A cross left, a cross right, to the near post, through the near post to the far post and through the emptiness where no striped sock emerged. Town stuck in neutral, Townites coagulating in clumps in the shadows of the Ramstand, merely standing stones weathering and wilting.

MOVE!

There is no movement.

There is nothing, nothing but silence, a simmering, festering silence in every stand. History will record that one minute was added. Time to change the record Dave.

2nd half – Echoes
Neither team made any change at half time.

The ground was very quiet, and the drizzle—we are in November now—pressed against the Ramstand windows like an excluded ghost. Something stirred and someone tried as Town started to attack down the right. Vernam! Some call it a shot, I call that a typo.

In a most rare perambulation northwards the gentle folk of Birkenhead took the coastal air and Patrick's squiffle fluffled in off the consternated Ironside. Flags be a-fluttering for the old Hurst reject was trespassing on our land again. Ironside offside, no-one cried, but the tide was turning.

On the hour a switch was flicked with a flick and switch from left to right. Rodgers roamed, Burns chinkled deeply and Vernam, half a dozen yards out, walked into the ball, as did Murphy's shuffling feet, the old codger saving by accident. The corner flickled deep to the edge of the penalty area and Walker's venomous volley simmered lowly through the barricades. The covered corner whooped as the unsighted Murphy flew low and right to superbly sweep aside as black and white boots swooped.

Brum-brum, Town had turned on the engine and were really motoring now. A Burns cross low, a Burns cross high, we're getting cross. Get some striped socks in the box!

Half way through the half Kabia replaced Warren and Town moved to three at the back. The Cork Express, that'll do nicely, sir.

Revved up and raring to go, there's only one way the ball doth flow. Walker waltzed and winkled wayly out west. Burns cut infield, scootled past a limp biscuit and, just inside the 'D', wrenched lowly in off the keeper's left-hand post when, fortunately, the keeper's left foot didn't know what the right hand was doing.

Tranmere hadn't crossed the halfway line, the game a match only in theory, merely televised striped shooting practice. There's only one team gonna win this now. Isn't there? Isn't there?

And merrily we roll along, bursting with schemes and dreams of elevation. Yes, elevate that corner. Staunton outcurled a corner and McJannet's near-post flickle header snicked off blue body parts. Rose rolled on the bye-line, wrinkle-pickled across the face of goal and Kabia's nurdle was flicked off near the line. Yes, yes the linesman's flagging, but Town are nagging away at the open door.

Burns' cross flicked off blue and beyond, a Rodgers cross floated ethereally close to heaven. And Slim Charles. Town squared the hypotenuse and Vernam dripped deeply from the left to right. Patrick dawdled inside the six-yard box and Burns drifted in front, knocking the ball across the face of goal, with Murphy dumbstruck and non-plussed, rooted to the earth. By the right post, the goal open, Burns clobbered from three or four yards out as Murphy sprinkled and sprawled. As three quarters of the ground prepared to arise, Sir Darragh, the ball bounced off the post, back into the centre and straight to a transfixed tourist.

With ten minutes left Dennis their menace appeared, as if by magic. But who exited stage left? Our friend Jennings, as usual, of course. Kristian Dennis, a man who never was for us, a man feeling fortunate to have been born in the age of XXL shorts. If it looks like a duck and waddles like a duck we may be in luck.
The desperate Transmen ailing and flailing, reduced to blocks, barges and shoulder charges to stem the flow. And Walker widdled wide. And Kabia crossed through the six-yard box, dissecting and bisecting both goal and Vernam.

With a couple of minutes left Amaluzor and Oduor replaced Rose and Walker and Tranmere increased the pace of the diddling and dawdling eking out seconds, seeking solace in the erosion of time and will.

Six minutes were added. A quick zim-zam-zoo and Kabia's slicing slash veered wide and over the left angle of post and bar. Wirralites wafting and wasting time, wanting the world to end. Town still on the march. A cross fliffled deep, deep into the Tranmere penalty area, Kabia in front of his marker. A blue duvet wrapped itself around the falling forward and heads turned to see the officials officially unstirred.

And at this point, with the clock ticking ever closer to the end of time, it occurred to us all that Tranmere hadn't had one shot in the second half. Not one. Not a squiff, a hint, a momentary thought that one could happen maybe. They were simply a blue wall shuttling sideways in the distance. In the game, but not of the game.

Wouldn't it…

A chip and chase and finally the Birkenhead bandits won a corner. Ya-di-ya. Nothing. As Pym looked to release the hounds, deceitful double rugby tackles behind the ref's back dampened the spirits and the moment and momentum was lost. And still Town attacked, Burns coiling, panic in the streets and the ball ricocheted and rolled back to Murphy who had his back to the play and the wall.

A whip and whack and a woozy Wirralite wafter was not whacked, but flipped forward by Turi. The ball bounced and Amaluzor was smashed and clashed, a-tumbling to earth. The ball ran to a bluesman and Joseph by-passed Turi underneath the Police Box. The cross shivered between knocking knees, bounced off Burns and perfectly into the path of a duck waddling in the left corner of the six-yard box. Dismal Dennis turned and tapped past Pym.

The End.

Another day, another day of amateur hour alchemy, turning gold into lead, but not a lead. Town were sclerotically shocking in the first half, reduced, as they often are, to shuffling hoofers when a bunch of dreary Hurstballers appear before them.

They bucked up, they perked and then they, well, fell in between the gaps as we, yet again, found a way to not only avoid winning, but be defeated when there was nothing to be beaten by. Tranmere have one goal: avoid relegation. Yet they managed to score two.

Now, the deeper question remains. Turi is a fine footballer, but does he fit with Artellball? He's an old-fashioned smoocher and schmoozer, rather than fast tick-tocker. He's waiting for teammates to move, teammates are waiting for him to surge and create space for them to move into. He's not a replacement for McEachran, he's complimentary. Playing one up top at home has got to stop. Playing four at the back is now merely exposing each defender's failings.

This season opportunity knocks, but we'll fail to progress by knocking it long. In the words of the Sage of Sincil Bank: can we not knock it?

We're seething John, and Matt, we're seething.

That's it, that's enough. An emergency locksmith's required.