The Diary

Cod Almighty | Diary

Just be good to me

9 April 2021

Daubney Diary writes: Oh look, a division four owner has made a mad statement. Relax, our messiah-complex's most recent sermons were on Christmas Eve and Holy Thursday, meaning he's not due again until Ascension Thursday on May 13. Put it in your GTFC calendar. Having been passed over for the takeover during Passover, we can hope there will be white smoke from the remaining two wise men before the First Thursday after Cambridge. 

About five must-win games ago, Bottom of the Barrel Diary made the astute observation that at this stage of the season "....the bottom of the division starts to look like a wheelbarrow full of panicking rabbits being pushed towards an abattoir door. And, in that situation, as we all know, anything can happen". 

Last week, it was the Town boardroom hopping about. This week it's fellow bottom feeders and county rivals, Southend and Colchester who are united in name and farce.

Southend first and they gave manager Mark Molesley the hook last last night. Obviously impressed by our eight match unbeaten run, they’ve gone down the re-appointment route for his replacement, with Phil Brown taking charge at Roots Hall for a second time. Town of course had a near miss a few years ago when they offered the chatty ex-Premier League boss the manager's position at Blundell Park in 2018. Probably for the best we never appointed anyone like that.

Brown went on to *checks wiki* manage Swindon and Hyderabad United. From the outside it resembles a roll of the dice with the board already in the process of being folded away for the night. A quick surf of the Southend twitter and the collective reaction can be summed up as one of "FFS".

Colchester were hopping mad earlier in the day. Their owner Robbie Cowling drew approving nods from Humberston by managing three statements in one day. The first gave us guffaws as he attempted to explain some alleged fisticuffs with a charity worker. Apparently, he "never called Mark an F'ing C". That's appalling. Disgusting. Some of the worst swear filtering we've seen. We've referred this one to the Fishy and been informed that you should use "fornicating girl private" otherwise you can look a right "sharp object". 

The second and third statements from Cowling quelled rumours that he was about to put the club into administration, ending points deduction straw-clutching from the relentlessly optimistic GTFC fanbase. No such luck, we'll have to best Colchester and their £31 million debt fair and square.   

All this is far removed from the actual football. When we were young, Town had aspirations. Division One was a realistic aim. Now those dreams, along with being seemingly unattainable, you'd have to question whether you want them at all. Who wants to end up like Colchester, in a drafty shoebox stadium at the bottom of the league and gazillions in debt to a bloke who doesn't know how to swear filter?

Even if it works out, you just become another Burnley, Bournemouth or Sheffield United. Bad enough that we'd make up the numbers as cannon fodder for the elite but can you imagine the patronising gits on Match of the Day? We'd be renamed Grimsby Town Snigger.

I'm tempted to regard it as a coping mechanism for our league position and a year without attending games but this realisation set in long before watching Town meant streaming passes in your front room instead of steaming pisses behind the Main Stand. We're in a sport that has placed a limit on our ambitions, so why eat yourself in pursuit of success? Real success is a team you can identify and identify with, and a good day watching them. I'll leave it up to you whether the highlight of that good day for you is ignoring potential liver damage to start into ten cans of Dorfmeister at 6am or a half time tea and Kit-kat. 

For a much-needed reminder of better times and a special group of players, Matt Dean shared a snippet of an interview with Craig Disley which demands your attention. Flipping 'eck, he mentioned Mrs Diz and that reminded me of the his and hers three fish tattoos. That's some powerful medicine that. 

If we could bottle that medicine, we would have no fear of Bradford or anyone else over the coming month. Tomorrow's trip to Valley Parade thankfully comes without the distraction of Ian Holloway v 'Bill' but does carry the threat of the Wolds Panther mauling our defence. I went hunting for a bit of team news but all I can find is Hursty the crafty git just reassuring everyone that the takeover is still proceeding.

Whoever plays, it would be nice to watch or listen to a game where we get into a two or three or eight-goal lead. You know, to rid us of that sick knot waiting to concede a goal so late it will be officially classified in the history books as coming in the third minute of the game next week.

Enjoy your weekend. For more reading, we've Pat Bell's excellent archive piece on the 1987-88 season available. We're also looking for your recollections of other sports at Blundell Park. We've had bungee jumping and strongman events but we're also looking for photos or accounts of wrestling, baseball and rugby league played there in the 1980s. And anything else for that matter, up to and including Roy 'Chubby' Brown claiming the world record for largest prawn cocktail.