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2003-04
Series editor:
Pete Green
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Rough guide to Division Three
Pete Green
17 May 2004
We're here for the duration. Keep on keeping on.
And here we are again. It doesn't seem five minutes since I was introducing the rough guide to Division Two, and we were dreaming all summer long of Town strutting grandly back up to the first - with Des Hamilton dominating the midfield, Laurens Ten Heuvel proving to be Boulding's perfect striking partner, and nothing but nothing getting past Tony Crane at the back.
Oh well.
Let's not get all purple-faced and bulgy-veined and write letters to the Telegraph about tearing up season tickets, burning the BP tea lady and unleashing a chain of small nuclear explosions under towns with funny shaped churches, though, eh. Let's be philosophical. Every silver lining has a cloud, after all, and the Mariners' spectacular failure in the 2003-04 season is just the price we all have to pay for the wondrous, the glorious feast of hastily thrown together, half-arsed internet research that is Cod Almighty's rough guide to Division Three.
It's about a decade and a half since Town last dipped to the Football League's lowest tier, and things seem to have changed a bit down here since we've been away. Replacing the old system of re-election with automatic promotion from the Conference has been the kick up the arse that the bottom rung needed. Where the third division once stank of complacency and mediocrity, like popular music in the 1970s just before punk, there's a bit more zing about it these days; and of the 23 clubs we'll be up against in 2004-05 I make it five we've never previously faced in a competitive fixture.
You see? No need for your anger, Grasshopper. For every Celebrity Wife Swap there's a Six Feet Under; for every Mel C, a Debbie Harry. And as soon as I can remember the name of that brilliant pub I found in Kidderminster ten years ago, I will be sure to let you know.
We're here for the duration. Keep on keeping on.
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