Cod Almighty - Diary

daily independent coverage of Grimsby Town FC

Diary - March 2008

Monday 31 March
It's the day after for Leeds Diary and the rest of Town's following and there is, for a change, an overwhelming consensus amongst Town fans on not one but two fronts. First and foremost our team did well to make another Wembley appearance ("the third in four years," in the world of Buckley). And secondly we were deservedly beaten by a superior side, one that does sit at the head of the fourth division table with Peterborough. No laments then on Willy Guéret's penalty saved from the Bosh, nor the legitimacy of their penalty. It's a shame that Town were the Franchise's last hurdle for their first sense of 'history'. But little Town's huff, puff and grit will only take you so far against a capitalist-driven, money-hungry juggernaut like the Franchise.

The "Big Day" is now over, thankfully, and let's look forward. Maybe we'll find out how the club plan to squander their big payday. The tax bill? Investment in players? Put towards the new stadium? Slapping it all into a high interest savings account? Or possibly even to pay off some board members' loans? Let us look forward to Saturday as well now the diversion has passed. Time to roll up sleeves, get our heads back down and concentrate on the league. You know – that competition we were doing pretty well in until we qualified for Wembley? Beat Rochdale, grab three points and our slim play-off hopes stay alive. And yes, reader, I do feel that anything less than a win this coming weekend will spell the end to Town's topsy-turvy season in the space of six days, leaving five fixtures of tinkering and trialling for Alan Buckley.

It wasn't all cup final fever over the weekend for some Town fans, you know. After the success of our mighty anti-Franchise T-shirts people just weren't happy letting the Franchise have some of their hard-earned wonger. Guest Diary was one of those and has mailed about his non-Wembley attending weekend. "A few of us went to watch AFC Wimbledon on Saturday to present them and Town's trust with the profits from the T-shirt sales. And we had a magnificent time, only marred by the Wombles most unfortunate 4-2 loss. The atmosphere was tremendous, the bar had proper beer and the reception we got was very touching. Believe me they were all rooting for us yesterday and we got some nice messages of commiseration afterwards by email." But GD still watched the game, albeit on his Murdoch-funding tellybox: "There were crumbs of comfort to be drawn: Town ran their hearts out; Winkelman admitted both on FiveLive in the morning and on Sky in the afternoon that it had been the wrong thing to do and accepted 'that people will neither forgive nor forget'. So that is as near as we will get to an apology I suppose." Given Winkieman's joy at winning and non-remorse at his actions, a spelt out apology will never be forthcoming.

And finally, another missive, this time from the bearded Si Wilson, asking you, dear reader, to send in pictures of you and your mates at Wembley for our upcoming gallery, preferably modelling one of our T-shirts. The email address to send those shots to is simon@codalmighty.com. Please, no topless fat men though.

Which leaves me to say, adios, and tune back in tomorrow lunch, when things will much the same as today: we will be desperately trying to get the Diary live by 2pm, and the Bastard Franchise Scum, with their new-found history, will still be the Bastard Franchise Scum.

Friday 28 March
Quite a few of you reading this have a trip to London to negotiate this weekend. I hope the trains run, the buses don't break down and that everyone has a great time before, during, and after. If you happen to have bought one of the twelve hundred or so Cod Almighty T-shirts sold since we started doing them, then how about getting a picture for our Wembley special that Si Wilson has promised for next week? He has told you how to send mobile phone snaps here.

And a gang of us will be taking our specially commissioned anti-franchise banner to the AFC Wimbledon home match against Horsham tomorrow, together with £500 to split between the GTFC supporters' trust and the Wombles' trust. The T-shirt man tells me the latest club fans to have latched on to the franchise T-shirts are the Luton lot. It's amazing how the internet can sell you for you without advertising, or lifting a finger really – especially if the cause is as good as the shirt is stylish.

Your Guest Diarist happens to believe that the match on Sunday will be won or lost in midfield. Can Bolland, Boshell and Hunt be a successful triumvirate, or will they fail to cope with the highly paid skilled mercenaries that the evil Winkelman has hired to push his made-up, stolen team up the leagues? Lord Buckley – well, well aware, for once, of the quality of players hired by the Bastard Franchise Scum – looked tired as he talked to the bloke from Mariners World. When his interviewer revealed a cunning plan he had thought up to loan in someone good just for the final, Buckley let him down as gently as he could. The squad has changed little in the 18 months since Buckley returned, but with the succession of eye-catching prospects coming through from the academy why should we need to loan in tired, unmotivated journeymen? The half-million pound prize was won getting to this final; winning it is just a matter of overcoming odds of 3/1 against.

Mr Chris Kamara, whom I shall give the benefit of the doubt to by describing as that lovable rogue from Sky Sports, has done a preview on the final. As usual he rattles on about Danny North, manages to remember Bolland's name and then that of, ermm, Peter Bore. But maybe Sunday is a day for young Mr Bore to make his next comeback? Buckley has said the team will be announced to the players after dinner on Saturday. Whatever line-up he chooses, young Ryan Bennett will be no doubt contemplating his future after his call-up to the young England squad yesterday. "It's only a matter of time before he goes," I hear the more world-weary among you mutter. But at least Mr Kamara is not touting him to his Championship-club-manager mates. Not yet anyway. Enjoy the weekend. See yer.

Thursday 27 March
Do you remember the good old days of the Diary? When I used to write six days a week? And I told you what I was having for lunch? And where I was going out drinking? And Town were getting relegated every year and Danny Butterfield was leaving on a free transfer because the club didn't know how the Bosman rules work? Ah, yes. Back in the good old days we had some laughs. And most of them were at the expense of Teamtalk – the commercial football website that was even more clueless than the Diary and used to reel off hilarious inaccuracies about the Mariners on an almost daily basis. Don't you miss those days? Well, they could be coming right back, because Teamtalk has just found an interview with John Fenty (Con) and recycled it into a short item with a cock-up that ranks alongside the site's finest vintage. Amid a plethora of the chairman's characteristic Unspeak about the Fentydome's "seven-day income streams", the author of the piece refers to the club's "new Conoco Stadium close to the town centre". Ah, if only it were, Teamtalk – if only it were.

Let's move on – from an issue of no relevance to the Mariners' visit to Wembley this Sunday, to the reserves' game against York at Blundell Park last night. A full and satisfying match report on the superb new official website reveals that the only goal of the game was scored by Town substitute Steve Davis in the 72nd minute. No-one was injured. No-one died.

"In Wednesday's Diary you say that you 'see the issue of which division Town play in as a little more important than an inconsequential paint-themed bauble'," begins an email from Brian Robinson, reassuring me that someone is reading after all. "Pardon me, but a look at the last accounts for the club clearly shows the importance of these inconsequential baubles. We are in debt and we need the cash so this isn't the time to be proud and sit on your high horse bemoaning Town's success. I'd guess that we will get a six-figure sum from the fixture which will go some small way to relieving the financial pressure on the club so let's just get behind Town and have a great day out on Sunday." GTFC will get a six-figure sum whether they win or lose at Wembley though, won't they, Brian? So if you will insist on doing the chairman's job for him and worrying about the bank balance, then surely the outcome of the Dulux Cup's two-legged area final was far more significant than what happens this weekend? Naturally, like every right-thinking football supporter in England, the Diary wants Town to win on Sunday, as I want Town to win every game they play. I don't think we will, but it'll hurt much less than having to spend another year in the fourth division. Every bugger else seemed to give up on promotion, though, the very instant the final whistle blew against Morecambe the other week. Now, where's that high horse? Giddy-up, boy!

And that's me done for a bit, as your regular Diary has just decided I'm having a week off, so I'll see you on Monday 7 April, and the guests and stand-ins will see you through more than capably until then, I'm sure. There's one last email before I go though. "Has anybody mentioned that the clocks go forward this weekend?" asks Eve Barnard. They have now, Eve. Thanks! But will Paul Bolland do likewise? Go forward, I mean, not mention that the clocks go forward. Ideally, I guess, he'll do both. Goodbye!

Wednesday 26 March
Danny North and Ciaran Toner getting "one last pre-Wembley run-out" is the angle taken by today's Grimsby Telegraph on tonight's reserve fixture against York City. After his recent knee injury North seems to have been rushed back into action some way short of match fitness and accordingly turned in two awful performances over the Easter weekend; similarly, one can only hope Toner's decisive contribution to Brentford's winning goal on Monday was due to fatigue rather than disinclination. The Telegraph, of course, made clear its intention to treat the current sequence of crucial fixtures in Town's play-off challenge as little more than a warm-up for the Dulux Cup final when it billed the 7 March game against Bastard Franchise Scum as a "dress rehearsal" for Wembley – but, for those of us who see the issue of which division Town play in as a little more important than an inconsequential paint-themed bauble, it is disappointing in the extreme to see GTFC apparently doing likewise.

Tuesday 25 March
"Easter sends people into a giddy tizz, doesn't it," wrote Tony Butcher on Good Friday in an email to Cod Almighty as a whole, rather than the Diary, but I might as well have it since the Postbag seems to have been abducted by aliens for the 18th time in his short letter-page-editing career. Mr B continues: "Iffy O, Lincoln's temporary Iffy coach, is contemplating a late run to the play-offs. 'Don't write us off, anything is possible,' he says. No it isn't. They're six points behind even us, even." And an unfavourable comparison with the Mariners' chances of a top-seven finish may be just about the perfect way to emphasise the slenderness of Onuora's play-off hopes after the shocking performance from Town's defence in yesterday's home defeat by a very ordinary Brentford side. "I think since we got through to Wembley we haven't been the force we were," observed Lord Alan Buckley, whose team had suffered only one defeat in 16 games before qualifying for the final of the Dulux Cup but has lost three out of five since. Not that Lincoln securing a place in the play-offs tends to result in promotion, of course.

Still, if you think yesterday's Grimsby performance was depressing, it wasn't as depressing as this one.

Friday 21 March
Your Guest Diarist is not of the christian persuasion and thus good friday (no caps please editor – I've already had to physically wrestle microsoft flipping word in order to take them off, and it has still left an angry looking red squiggly line under the twin blasphemies of refusing to capitalise a christian holiday and the name of the fools who wrote this bloatware) is the most pointless day of the year. No football and too cold to consider doing much of owt in the garden; it really is a long good friday.

Tomorrow, though, we have Mansfield away. [Oh, are you sure that's not 'mansfield'? – ed.] A Mansfield who appear to be playing better under a caretaker manager who delights in the name Dutch Holland. Well, it's better than Harry Wales, I suppose. Mr Holland reckons they have been sharp in training and is relishing the prospect of two more games in charge over the bank holidays. Town, meanwhile, continue to welcome players back in to training from injury. Toner has trained all week and Danny North trained on Thursday, the superb new official site tells us. Lord Buckley hasn't had time to have a chat with Dale this week (or vice versa, possibly) but did rattle out a quick interview with the Telegraph in which he revealed that it is hard to know who to play and who to rest. That's what we trust and pay you for, Alan, but just make sure you play Butler while he is in the goalscoring mood – too long on the bench might do his back no good at all.

The lack of injuries and suspensions is quite scary actually. With Rotherham being pushed down the table (and, by the way, I for one am glad that it looks like a rescue package is happening for them), Town's money worries being eased a bit by the Wembley thing and the aforementioned full-squad-available situation, maybe that imaginary friend in the sky is giving us a bit of help here and there after all? I'll set my religious compass back to agnostic, shall I?

You are not getting a lot more today, folks, because I have promised Cod Almighty T-shirt man that I will help him pack up 300 assorted CA T-shirts to post out of the weekend. Yes, the promised delivery arrived yesterday, and very snazzy the anti-franchise ones look too. Sadly the Wombles' mascot has been prohibited from wearing one because of the draconian conditions imposed on AFC Wimbledon when they managed to get their own club history back from the BFS, but their home match against Horsham next Saturday will be awash with anti-Franchise shirts and general bonhomie towards Grimsby Town fans. So if you are in London at the weekend, why not go along and 'release the peace' with a Womble or two, especially if you have tales of Harry Haddock and the like.

The T-shirt man has had offers of seventeen free pints and two proposals of marriage from Wombles so far, he tells me. After the former there may be a danger of accepting the latter, of course. He says there is still time to order T-shirts for Wembley, but Sunday is the absolute last day and even then it depends on the postal service delivering a small first class parcel within four Earth days. Anyway, that's your lot – let's hope we beat the Stags and no-one gets injured or sent off. See yer.

Thursday 20 March
"Defining what 'it' is" wasn't the only thing Durham Diary neglected yesterday. Unreported later on this page, Town's reserve team travelled to an away fixture against Darlington on Tuesday night and managed to lose again, this time by one goal to nil, despite apparently fielding 16 players. According to the Grimsby Telegraph, the match took place at the home of nearby Norton & Stockton Ancients FC, rather than at the George Reynolds New Stadium Williamson Motors 96.6 TFM Darlington Balfour Webnet Darlington Arena, presumably to keep the playing surface at the latter in its current immaculate and pristine condition.

Durham also wrote off Town's chances of making the play-offs, despite the administrators' return to Rotherham leaving the Mariners only five points away from seventh place, largely on the grounds of Rochdale's games in hand. In this he neglected the important historical lesson that Rochdale have always played fewer games at this time of the season due to their often waterlogged pitch, always look capable of a late play-off push because of their games in hand, and always lose them. Town are due at Spotland a week on Saturday, of course. Fancy a trip west, Durham, or are you passing from youthful exuberance into jaded pessimism?

To today's news, then, and the Diary's ageing heart leaps a little at the announcement of a new three-year contract for Town's longest-serving player ~~Sir John McDermott~~ Nick Hegarty. Although it is only recently that he has established himself in the first team, the flame-haired left winger from Pontefract, or is it Wakefield, seems to have been aged 21 for the entire five years that he's been on the books at Blundell Park. Hegarty was the subject of an approach in January from Dundee, who were impressed by the player's form in the first half of the season and thought he looked a bit Scottish, but stuck around to keep getting better and scoring goals, and has now put his name to a new deal keeping him in Cleethorpes up to 2011. "Who knows, there could still be a big finish to the season from us," the player muses in the Telegraph, clearly more than aware of Rochdale's tendency to lose their games in hand.

Upper-case type is this week's big concern for Boston United-supporting Diary reader Pete Brooksbank. "I understand you are huge fans of Grimsby Town's SNOS or SONOS or whatever it is – and why not? The new PTV template is, well, busy, isn't it? But perhaps all is not as it seems. I was rather alarmed to receive an e-mail from Forest yesterday with the subject: 'Happy Easter PETE'. Christ! What have I done to upset Forest's website? I suspect it might have continued, had there been room: 'Happy Easter PETE – hope you CHOKE on your Easter egg PETE you BASTARD, where the FUCK were you when we needed you against WALSALL eh PETE – you're a DEAD man PETE'. All of which makes me a bit sad, because it immediately made me think of HAL and Arthur C Clarke, who probably wrote a short story that predicted the uprising of emotionless, cold-blooded websites belonging to provincial lower-league football clubs years ago. If only we'd listened. None of which is relevant to Grimsby at all, so I shall simply say please do football a favour and crush the Franchise Scum at Wembley – we can do you a deal on Crane if you'd like him back for the day, I'm sure." THANKS, Pete! There may be a use on the day for six-foot-five centre-backs with a short fuse and a big bum – even if it is only an incentive to get the match decided within 90 or 120 minutes, as TC's record from the penalty spot in this competition is not the best.

Before I take my leave of you, handing over to Guest Diary for tomorrow's round-up, we have an email from Mark Wilson, who has responded to Tuesday's doomy deconstruction of the marketing copy pasted wearily on to the SNOS in connection with the Dulux Cup final. "Having spent a short part of my career in PR and comms," he writes, "I'm fucking pleased I got out before my life was trashed by your expose of PR people's miserable existences. I can hold my head high now. Thanks Diary." That's OK Mark. As long as Mrs Diary doesn't read it and realise I've been spending my time composing outrageous public slurs upon her profession, I'll live to write another week.

Wednesday 19 March
Hi guys! Durham Diary here, called in last minute to replace His Royal Diaryness who pulled a bum cheek in warm up. There's a lesson for us all to learn from this.

First up today is a nugget of good news for all of us non-season-ticket-holding Grimsby fans who are planning to watch the Mariners play Brentford on Easter Monday. The club have taken the highly commendable and well received (from this direction at least) step of announcing reduced ticket prices for said fixture. The SNOS, not satisfied with a reduction, have gone one step further and urinated freely over the entry fee, proclaiming as they have "Brentford Prices Slashed".

If you haven't heard already, Rotherham United have entered administration for the second time in a couple of years. While my boxers are firmly strung round the Grimsby Town bedpost these days, it is true that I was born in Rotherham and have the hardest of soft-spots for them. Going into administration twice in such a short period of time smacks either of Martin Pringle-like luck or Peter Ridsdale-like management, and the upshot is that Rotherham will be served with another ten point penalty moving them out of the play-off places and moving Grimsby up one place in the league. The SNOS are lightning fast to point out that Town are now just five points off the playoff places, although when you consider our negative goal difference five becomes six, and when you consider Rochdale have three games in hand on us it looks suspiciously like 11. Sorry, forgot the goal difference again: 12!

So our season all boils down to Wembley, and let's at least be grateful we have that to relieve the boredom. The SNOS reckon we've shifted 20,300 tickets for the big day, which is more than we managed for either of the two playoff finals Town have appeared in. Better news still is that Town's opponents on the day (who I shall not name to save those of you with short tempers and high blood pressures) have increased their allocation and genuinely look like they may sell all 32,000 they've been given. Why is this such good news? Well according to the published rules of the Colouring Competition, the proceeds of each match, after paying "the travelling expenses of the Visiting Club, the ground and other expenses of the match including VAT, floodlighting of the playing pitch and ancillary lighting (not to exceed £200), advertising, printing, postage, police charges, turnstile operators, stewards, contribution to first aid helpers and clearing the ground of snow" will be split 45% to each club and 10% to The Football League. Presuming, as I have, that this applies also to the final, the Mariners receive a hefty chunk of each ticket their opponents sell. Whoopeeee! Let's just hope there's no snow – we can't afford it.

Oh, and Town will have two mascots at Wembley: Mighty Mariner and the Youngs' Fishfinger. I kid you not. Still, in my opinion while ever Youngs keep putting more money into the club than anyone else would they're entitled to exploit any big events Town are involved in. And who did a giant chip ever do any harm to? Except John Prescot...

So there you have it, though what 'it' is I have carefully avoided defining. How is it only Wednesday?

Tuesday 18 March
For the Diary the worst thing about slow news days – or indeed slow news weeks, as this one is turning out to be – is having to seek out material in the dreariest and least inspiring non-stories imaginable, which in normal circumstances I wouldn't even deign to click the headlines of, let alone trawl through every tedious sentence. One example is a profoundly soporific press release from the sponsors of the Dulux Cup, reproduced word for word on the Mariners' superb new official website. Here, proving that the current era will be forever remembered as the zenith of Western civilisation's achievement in the pursuit of sheer boredom, we learn that the trophy now has its own profile on Facebook. Oh, sorry, I seem to have forgotten my clichés; I mean social networking phenomenon Facebook. If you haven't got any other friends, then, you can now go online and pretend to be friends with a shiny metal cup. "The trophy is reshaping the way football reaches out to the wider community," wrote some desperate PR and comms drone as the minimum effort necessary to satisfy their boss and pass a few more moments until they can go home and fall asleep in front of Hollyoaks as one more day of their eventless life passes until they can get joylessly trashed at the weekend and repeat ad infinitum until at last a horrific realisation dawns that their decades of life on this planet have amounted to nothing, nothing at all, and even as this chill terror pervades their marrow they can only submit mutely and in paralysis as confronted by the vacant awful mesmeric countenance of Death himself.

"Can you thank all those folk who have ordered CA T-shirts for me, Mr Diary?" writes Cod Almighty's T-shirt man. "We have orders for 200 anti-franchise ones. Not bad in four days with little publicity. Our T-shirt supplier, after tearing his hair out because of the upcoming bank holidays, is flat out getting them printed to meet our posting deadline. I have updated the T-shirt order screens so you can see what we have in stock, and if anyone wants one they can order up until Friday to get delivery before Wembley. I've got a little house elf helping me now, but don't worry, folks – we are a fully paid-up member of SPEW. Sure thing! Thanks, everyone!

Monday 17 March
Today is not a good Diary day. It's not a bad day for the Diary – the remains of the disappointing vindaloo that took an hour and 20 minutes to be delivered last night seem to have been improved by their 12 hours maturing in the fridge – but it's not a good Diary day, as there is chuff all to tell you about the Mariners. We probably won't get in the play-offs after stumbling to defeat on a pitch that should have Darlington thrown out of the league; GTFC are getting to grips with Paypal to shift a few more tickets for some match or other at the end of the month; and today's Mariners World interview with Martin Butler may be the most supremely pointless and uninformative item of football media ever created.

It is a good thing, in the circumstances, that Richard Lord has flung an email this way – and even better that it stretches to two paragraphs. "I know Alan Shearer's done that cycling thing to raise cash," is how the first one begins, "and for that he should be applauded – especially as he had to endure the company of Adrian Chiles and his highly annoying Brummie monotones for the whole journey – but I couldn't help detecting that wily ol' Shearer still has it in for referees, despite playing out most of his career as 'a right dirty bastard', in the words of my good Newcastle-supporting friend. He seemed to disagree with every decision the referee made in the Arsenal/Middlesbrough game, and talked about 'little shoves' that strikers don't get away with but defenders do. And then I noticed the referee who wasn't very high in Shearer's estimation was none other than Mark Halsey, the official who allowed Justin Whittle to deliver that smug, arrogant, self-satisfied hypocrite a much deserved and long overdue elbow in the face." Y'see, I could take Town not getting promoted when we had things to divert us, like that and Steve Evans getting thrown out of Blundell Park...

"It's ironic," continues Richard. "Mark Halsey has been my favourite referee ever since that time he gave us two penalties and sent an opposing defender off in that 6-1 win over Barnsley four seasons ago. Halsey even had the good sense to show Tony Crane a red card in that game too, for being a hot-tempered, fat-bottomed, useless waste of space, who couldn't keep his fists to himself when 5-1 up. Let it be known – Mark Halsey is awesome; Shearer is a moaning bastard who won't let a bit of 'humerus' fun go. (Actually, I've done a search and it appears to be Whittle's ulna bone that connected with Shearer's lip that night)." Of course, the best possible fundraiser for Sport Relief would've been like Ricky Gervais and, um, that other bloke did the other year: Whittle v Shearer slugging it out in the ring. I just can't quite see the millionaire sheet metalworker's son readily agreeing to let the Sarge 'do him' again, is all.

Friday 14 March
Gordon Brown and his acolyte Mr Darling may continue to be disingenuous about when the mythical economic cycle begins and ends, and are frankly clueless at present about what to do about more or less anything (to the point where all recent initiatives adopted by our so-called government have been started by that strangest of lobby groups, the Conservative Party), but as far as your Guest Diarist is concerned, life as a Town fan is much simpler and easier to document. The Grimsby Town bust cycle ended on 4 December. With a final bang, as we got comprehensively stuffed 4-0 by Darlington at home.

And then the boom started. Twenty-three league games later we sit at the very top of the mid-table obscurity zone, looking at the back of the other teams' shirts in the play-off race immediately above us. Sadly, although we continue to accumulate points at a quite impressive rate, the play-off pack are not really that much closer. If Rotherham, as rumoured, go in to administration again, then we inch a step upwards by virtue of the Millers' financial misfortune, but we remain reliant on others running in to a bad patch, don't we? Incidentally, the first football fan to scoff a Pukka pie did so at Millmoor, according to the questionable oracle that is Wikipedia that is. And no, I have no idea how parlous the Rotherham finances really are, so don't get your selfish hopes up.

And tomorrow we trek up the A1 to visit the Quakers. Not to a nice town centre ground like Feethams, but to a big shiny place on the flipping A66 bypass, risibly named the Balfour Webnet Darlington Arena. You can stretch your legs; you can see every blade of grass on the pitch from wherever you sit (oh, hang on a minute – there aren't that many blades actually, because the pitch is in a right state); you can make endless anagrams from the impossibly long sponsorship name to the place; you can imagine that a really big club plays here. Thank your god at least that Darlo manage to stay in the top half of the table these days then.

In fact this is possibly the best Darlington side ever, ably managed by that Penney bloke who worked wonders at Donny. I am not ashamed to admit that I am a Balfour Webnet Darlington Arena virgin. although my cherry will be plucked on the morrow (or however the saying goes; I haven't really read much Mills & Boon). A test of our defence, a test of our moral resolve, a test of whether the Butler–Jones partnership is as good as it promised against the frankly pathetic Barnet the other night. In all, a good game in prospect, against fit and tough opposition.

As for team news, then, the Mariners World interview with Lord Buckley has illuminated the great man's thinking. Hunt, who was rested in midweek, is fine and it sounds like he will return to the starting eleven. Toner is training well, but it is too soon to bring him back, and Danny North will continue to rest the back of his knee, which remains sore. All others are fit for selection. Although the scoreline the other night was emphatic, the match will be remembered more for Town's attacking build-up play than for the defensive work, so the return of Hunt will be applauded (within this camp anyway).

The Diary has received an email from a frankly impatient young scamp by the name of Ben Gresswell. He says: "I thought there would be a dedicated marketing campaign from Cod Almighty towers to promote your excellent T-shirts in advance of the forthcoming trip to Wemberleeee? Surely you're missing out on a nice little earner to put towards your annual AGM in the pub? I know at least three people considering purchasing the 'Alan Buckley's Black and White Army' T-shirt for this special occasion. And let's be honest, your tees are certainly classier and dare I say it 'uber cool' in comparison to anything being churned out from BP. Come on Cod Almighty, sort it!"

Well, Ben, when your missive arrived we were too busy toiling over our Wembley anti-franchise T-shirt project to even crack a smile. Launched in our renowned higgledy-piggledy style over the course of yesterday, this glorious piece of fashion polemic has had a rather dramatic effect on the Cod Almighty T-shirt man's inbox, which is now full of advance orders from Mariners fans, AFC Wimbledon fans and folk of good taste and moral sensibility from all parts of England. For every shirt sold a quid goes to the Grimsby Town Supporters Trust and another quid goes to the AFC Wimbledon trust. Out of the eight quid they cost, that leaves almost enough to pay the greedy god Paypal, the T-shirt supplier and of course the postage. So, if you can be arsed of course, why not order one today? The earlier you order one, the less chance that we will run out before the cup final, so please help these two worthy causes and keep our T-shirt elf in a job, eh?

It is claimed that this website takes the piss out of the club occasionally. "Moi?" said Mr Diary in a recent interview. But today your Guest Diarist wants to applaud the hard work done by those unsung folk in the ticket office whom, shall we say, have had a hard week, with a frenetic weekend still to come. It takes a lot of effort to shift the best part of ten thousand tickets and they may have to sell nearly as many again next week. So if you see any of them out tonight why not buy them a drink, eh? See yer.

Thursday 13 March
With every courageous tackle he makes, with every towering header he wins, with every enterprising long throw-in he takes, and every fourth division young apprentice of the year award he claims, Grimsby Town supporters are as afraid of the possibility of Ryan Bennett leaving for some big club as they are delighted with his emergence on North East Lincs. But Lord Alan Buckley will probably need to sign one fewer centre-half in the summer now that Matthew Bird has signed a professional contract – and it's at Blundell Park, not the MU Glazerbowl. A 17-year-old left-footer who hit the headlines earlier this season following a trial with global megabrand Manchester United, Bird has put his name to a two-year deal to keep him with the Mariners and told the Grimsby Telegraph: "I am really proud to have signed for my hometown club. I grew up around here and it will be good to give something back." The Diary is delighted to see another local kid on his way through the ranks, and hopes to see him debut for the first team before too long – but I can't help worrying about whether there's a replacement in the under-16s who'll be ready to step in when the Glazer Corporation steps back in for young Matthew.

If, as we are often assured, the best young players can learn from their mistakes then Bird should improve as a direct result of Town's reserve team losing 1-0 at home to Rotherham last night. The visitors' goal resulted from a penalty conceded by the Mariners' newest professional, but the club's superb new official website reports on a good show from the front line of Andy Taylor and Nathan Jarman and reserve debuts from two more stars of the youth team, as well as 90 minutes of play for Justin Whittle and Straight Peter Bore. I wonder what odds you could get on SPB making the starting XI a fortnight on Sunday?

"Nice to see that the Freibooter (FC Sankt Pauli) will be with us at Wembley," writes Tim Mosey in an email to the Diary, in response to Tuesday's contribution from one of the aforementioned Freibooter, Martin Robinson. "Couldn't help noticing though, when I watched them on telly last night, that they have sold out and put a roof over the terracing. Nice touch though to have a massive 'Scheisse DSF' banner behind the goal to celebrate the fact that the TV company DSF had moved the game from a weekend to a very handy Monday night kick off. The GTFC/Werder Bremen 'Fischstadt Freundschaft' will also be at Wembley; has someone told the catereers to get extra Bratwurst in for the game?" Hmm. Don't suppose the Paulistas could bring a massive 'Scheisse BFS' banner a fortnight on Sunday...?

"People in glass houses eh?!" writes Chris Parrott. "Barnet didn't score against Town 'at the sixth time of asking'. I made that same mistake this morning with a Barnet- and Grimsby-supporting mate. He pointed out we played a friendly c. 1990 when the 'Barnet nil' sequence started." Thanks, Chris. I wonder if we're related – but more to the point, which of the two did your mate support first? It's hard to imagine how a Bees fan could harbour very much affection for Town given the clubs' head-to-head record, but conversely the Diary must be far from the only Mariner who has recently declared a lifelong love for Barnet.

In that spirit it seems only fair and right that today's final word should go to the unfortunate. "Yes," writes Jimbo, "I'm a Barnet fan claiming that pint. Can you chuck in a few spirits as well, and a nice fish and chip supper? It won't cost much for 42 of us." Well, you might have to share it, mate, but if we stay down and you stay up – and I'm sure Town fans everywhere will join me in wishing you all the best in your remaining fixtures – then come to the Rutland Arms next season and the Diary will see that you receive a comforting glass of Old Mill Bullion. Jimbo concludes existentially: "Why does this fixture exist?" Well, you could just not turn up and let the Football League award a 3-0 win to the Mariners every time. It might help your goal difference in the long run.

Wednesday 12 March
These are memorable times for Grimsby Town Football Club. The most successful manager in Mariners history is taking the side to Wembley ten years after his double win at the national stadium in 1998. The worst is behind us and, with just six points separating Town from the play-off places, some supporters are at last believing that an escape from the fourth division in the right direction might not be too many more years away. And Barnet have at last scored a goal against Town, at the sixth time of asking. Sadly for the Bees, their utter failure to win a single header or tackle or be remotely good at football last night in any way at all allowed Lord Alan Buckley's side to run in four of their own, lifting Town to their highest league position since Russell 'I Could Get Any Female Off The Street' Slade took his faltering team to the promotion play-off final almost two years ago. If any Barnet fans are reading, please email the Diary so that I can arrange to buy you a pint next time you come up to Cleethorpes. God knows we owe you.

To add insult to P6 W6 D0 L0 F17 A1 Pts18 injury, Richard Bedwell has emailed the Diary to point out another error in the spectacularly inaccurate match preview published on a Bees website and mercilessly taken apart by yesterday's Diary. With an ineptitude matched only by, well, his team, Barnet Mad contributor 'Jaybee' managed no fewer than 13 factual errors in his or her round-up of the GTFC squad, and I use the term "no fewer than" advisedly, as Richard has found a 14th. Martin Butler, it emerges, has not in fact "scored 59 goals in 372 league matches in his career so far," as claimed by Jaybee. "Soccerbase says 123 in 438," points out Bedders matter-of-factly. Thankyou. And with that I think we should stop, before Cod Almighty Towers is picketed by angry, placard-waving campaigners from the League Against Cruel Sports.

Tuesday 11 March
When they're not obligingly faffing about with 'crossbar challenges' broadcast by the global media corporation that has brought English lower-division football to its knees, there's nothing professional footballers enjoy more between matches than the occasional spot of training here and there. Unfortunately for the Mariners, though, another broadcaster has arrived in town to distract them from the activity of sharpening up their skills, fitness and tactical awareness. According to today's Grimsby Telegraph, ITV turned up at a Town training session last week to drag Tom Newey and Nathan Jarman away from what they were doing so they could take part in some other daft game. True, scoring goals with headers and volleys is a skill that may be more valuable during actual match situations than hitting the crossbar – but as the Mariners prepare for the most crucial stage of the season and bid to sneak into the promotion play-offs, do we really need commercial broadcasters turning up in Grimsby without so much as a by-your-leave to pull players out of training and make them jump through hoops like circus animals?

So to this evening's fixture at home to Barnet, and the Diary, as you may already be aware, is occasionally given to pointing out mistakes by other writers on the worldwide web. In normal circumstances I tend to restrict this to mistakes made by people who are being paid to write (and particularly if they are paid out of the money handed over for tickets and merchandise by Grimsby Town supporters). But sometimes the mistakes are so spectacular, sloppy or just plain relentless that I am obliged to lay in to a fellow amateur. Today is one of those occasions, and the guilty party is 'Jaybee' of the 'Barnet Mad' website, whose preview of tonight's game sets a new world record for factual inaccuracies per line of text. Let's get cracking, shall we?

"Last Saturday, they lost 1-0 at home" – it was Friday
"Peter Till who injured his hip on Saturday" – no, it was definitely Friday
"Philip Barnes, who moved to Grimsby a year ago" – it was June 2006
"Tom Newey, who joined from Leyton Orient" – no, it was Cambridge United
"James Hunt, a former Bristol Rovers defender" – that'll be a midfielder then
"Peter Till, signed last summer from Leyton Orient" – wrong time, wrong place: Till joined on loan from Birmingham in November 2006 and signed permanently the following January. What is this obsession with Orient?
"In midfield... Gary Jones... who scored 15 goals in the 2005-06 season, including a hat trick against Barnet" – it was 17 goals, and only two of them were against Barnet, but this should be enough to give some sort of clue as to his real playing position
"Danny North, a 19 year old" – Danny turned 20 last September
"Martin Butler, a very experienced striker, on loan from Walsall" – Butler signed permanently in January
"Up front... Ryan Bennett" – well, Mark Lever did it occasionally, I suppose

We'll let the bits pass about Toner and Bolland signing "two years ago" because they're only six or nine months out. For a slightly more accurate look ahead to tonight's game, check out Cod Almighty's pre-match factfile this afternoon, but let's also pay tribute to our comrades at Barnet Mad: to err is human, but to bugger things up as thoroughly as that must take a hell of a lot of dedication.

"I get the feeling the Diary is less than enthralled with Tuesday's win over Morecambe and subsequent trip to Wembley," wrote Martin Robinson in an email to the Diary late last week. Whatever gives you that idea? "I too felt somewhat bored and cold on Tuesday night with little enthusiasm for pitch invasions and celebrations after such a dire game. However, the best thing about the Wembley trip will be meeting up with the Hamburg (St Pauli FC) branch of the Town supporters club (three members so far), one of whom was present at the play-off final in '98. Remember, if you're ever in Hamburg, don't bother with Hamburg SV but watch the boys in brown at St Pauli FC where you can enjoy the football stood on the terrace with a currywurst and a beer in hand." Well, Martin, German football may retain the undeniable charms of beer and terracing, but answer me this: can you turn on a television or radio for the football in Germany and be regaled with the insightful and well-informed punditry of Alan Shearer, Spoony and Tim 'League Three' Lovejoy? Hmm. Where did I put that passport?

Monday 10 March
As nice as it may have been to watch the Mariners actually keeping clean sheets and winning games since their remarkable post-Christmas turnaround in form, there's only so much pleasure you can take from a team where none of the players have ever cracked Alan Shearer's smug face open and spilt his blood upon the Blundell Park turf. If we can't watch Justin Whittle on the pitch, though, we can at least see him in action on the pages of today's Grimsby Telegraph, where the iconic centre-half is to be found tackling the slippery issue of who should captain the side in his absence. Lord Alan Buckley has been unable to settle on a permanent skipper in recent months, with half a dozen players having taken turns on the armband, much to Whitts' amusement. "The gaffer seems a bit superstitious sometimes about it," observes the player. "It's just good to see the team doing well after the start we had. Whether that's down to all the different captains and their styles I'm not sure." Our ex-military stalwart goes on to express his hope of winning back a place in the team, but as the improved form of Town's defence continues, the captaincy looks set to continue rotating between just about every member of the squad bar Straight Peter Bore.

That said, Buckley's players looked some way short of their best for large spells of Friday night's home defeat against Bastard Franchise Scum – and even the manager has publicly suggested that the outcome might have been different had John Fenty (Con) not greased the wheels of the BFS promotion juggernaut by gutlessly accommodating their request that the game be moved forward from the Saturday afternoon just because they're playing again tonight. OK, those aren't his exact words, and what Buckley actually says to the Grimsby Telegraph is: "I would have liked another couple of days after Tuesday and let all this Wembley thing settle down. Off the pitch it can't, because there is so much to be organised, but from the players' point of view, I would have liked them to have had a couple of days' hard training and a bit of a breather. Tonight has come a bit too quick for us." In the context of JF(C)'s disgraceful and literally self-defeating decision to place the Franchise's convenience ahead of Town's own interests, this can easily be read as implicit criticism of the chairman by the manager. But the Telegraph, of course, is too shit-scared of Fenty's bullying of the media even to remind us of that context.

Diary reader Graham Plastow has emailed with some glorious reminiscences of his time supporting the Mariners, though these end with an abruptness that has the Diary fearing some kind of medical emergency. "In working my way through the site," he begins, "in idle moments on the road when Diary read and no horses to bet on, I noticed the lack of our 1965–66 FL Cup quarter final game with West Ham United in the club honours. The WHU of Moore, Hurst and Peters. Fresh from the ECWC win and tuning up for West Germany against the Mariners. In turn, the Town of Graham Taylor (yes that one), Matt Tees, Rod Green, Brian Hill, Ron Green and Charlie Wright. Also Big Ron (Cockerill) who may actually have been absent for injury, but his centre-back partner was playing, his name slips my aging brain, but he held the appearance record until Macca took it so gloriously. I know it was a quarter final because it was my debut at Blundell Park. More than 16,000 in the crowd and still a good view for a kid in the Pontoon that night. A glorious 2-2 with a Tees and Green double. The replay was lost by a single goal on their thin pitch, and I bet the goal was offside, at least that's what we said at school. I made a few other games that season including a". And that's where it ends. Graham? Are you OK, mate? Email again and put our minds at rest. I won't sleep at night until I find out which other games you went to!

Friday 7 March
So, folks, the week has worked itself round to Friday and Town fans everywhere have to face up to the twin evils of Friday night football and a home game against those Bastard Franchise Scum. Opposition awash with cash and drunk with success spawned from evil deeds. Tonight's game is important to Town: we need to redeem ourselves from a poor display in the corresponding away fixture when we conceded straight from the kick-off and never really got back in it; and we need three home points to keep alive those faint hopes of others failing in the last quarter of the season and allowing us to squeeze in to the play-offs.

Your Guest Diarist is a stubborn man whom more than once has come to regret taking principled stands – one of them being never to watch the BFS live in case they noticed and thus thought the world was coming round to their amoral way of thinking. At present I feel like a Methodist watching his mates file into the pub on a Friday night. I need to hum a hymn or two and stay strong. Never been a Christian, but I do like a good hymn, I must admit. And yes, I do have Sky, so what does that say about me, eh? A teetotal Methodist with a tattered picture of Fiona Richmond under his bed, the headstone will no doubt read.

Lord Buckley spent yesterday morning ~~bollocking~~ cajoling his squad down from cloud nine and preparing them for said important match. Mr Hunt's groin was sore but he trained anyway, while Danny North's problem is the back of his knee. A part of the body that nobody appears to have been arsed enough about to name. Buckley rates North as 50:50 for tonight and has also reaffirmed that Toner is a week away from being in contention for a first-team place.

AB, in his far from subtle campaign to keep notorious Grimsby heterosexual Peter Bore on his toes, observed in a dangerous but outwardly mild tone that Mr Bore had failed to impress when coming on as a sub the other night. He said no more, and he said no less. That was enough. Lord Buckley, of course, was chatting to Mariners World, and he also remarked that wholesale changes to the team tonight should not be expected. So that has scuppered another excuse to go tonight ("might this be Whittle's last home game?" the devil on my shoulder has been whispering, you see).

At this point one side of me wants to urge you, gentle reader, to boycott games like this. But that twisted logic can be ripped apart in so many different ways that perhaps we should leave it that you go and cheer the Town on while I wear that really prickly jumper me nanna knitted for me and sit there cursing and shaking my fist at the evil Sky Sports News. That'll do it. Let's hope for three points against this most despicable of opposition, with no injuries, no bookings or worse, and the chance to keep dreaming about those play-offs. Knowing my luck, though, we'll end up playing the Bastard Franchise Scum (who will somehow have slipped to fourth) again. See yer.

Thursday 6 March
The kids, as some doddery old bastard once sang, are alright – and at the moment there can't be many who are alrighter than Ryan Bennett. Town's brightest prodigy has acquitted himself with staggering maturity this season not only on the field, where his youth is belied by the calm effectiveness of his defending, but also in his Mariners World interviews, where he comes across as a decent young man who is grateful for the chances he's been given. In short, the Diary approves of young Bennett – and in this I am joined by Lord Alan Buckley, who has spoken warmly of the player in a Grimsby Telegraph interview after his recent recognition as fourth division apprentice of the year. "The way he conducts himself, and the manner he approaches his football is first class. He is a level-headed lad with tremendous ability and could quite easily go all the way to the top in the game," Buckley said. "I hope Straight Peter Bore is watching, because that stroppy little bugger could learn a lot from Ryan," he didn't add but could have.

One former player who, it is fair to say, conducted himself less well both on and off the pitch is Ashley Sestanovich. One of Russell Slade's early signings on a loan from Sheffield United in 2004, Transit Stan wowed Town fans with his pace and technique and then unwowed them again with a daft sending-off and a primadonna-ish I'm-too-good-to-be-a-sub flounce-out. Far worse was to follow, of course, as the player was eventually jailed for eight years for assisting a robbery in which a man was shot dead in south London – and it is in relation to this episode that Sestanovich is back in the headlines. The player's last club, Grays Athletic, is at risk of being thrown out of all competitions by the FA for refusing to fork out the his wages for the five months leading up to his conviction in 2006. "We are being forced to pay approximately £14,000 to a player who only had three training sessions and 20 minutes in a pre-season friendly," laments club chairman Mike Woodward. Which is undoubtedly harsh, but then Town had to pay approximately that much per week to Zhang Enhua, and all he did was ruin Peter Handyside's career and plunge the club into thousands more pounds of tax debt.

That's all from me for this week, but Friday will, as usual, see Guest Diary summarise thoughtfully a range of matters both footballing and not. So don't miss it. Thanks for reading and I'll see you on Monday. Byeee.

Wednesday 5 March
There will be face paint. There will be air horns. There will be five quid hot dogs. And there will be 25,000 tourists who can't be arsed to go down the road to see their local side and won't turn up again for another ten years afterwards. But probably the biggest downside of the Mariners reaching the final of the Dulux Cup is that it could undermine the players' league form at precisely the point when their minds need to focus exclusively and relentlessly on reaching the promotion play-offs. The Grimsby Telegraph has already demonstrated the danger perfectly, describing the next game – a crucial fixture in the hunt for points as Town should be looking to put pressure on the sides that stand between them and seventh place – as "a dress rehearsal against the Dons at home on Friday". Sure, those 25,000 tourists represent a captive market for the Telegraph as much as for the Cockney shysters flogging tatty flags on 30 March, but if the players – and, to some extent, the fans – start seeing every opportunity for three points as nothing more than a "dress rehearsal" for the Grand Day Out then they will be torn limb from limb by the promotion-hungry teams Town are set to face in most of the five matches between now and then – and could easily end the season down in 15th place again. So let's not mention Wembley again until the week before the game, OK?

"Congratulations on reaching Wembley!" writes Pete Brooksbank in an email to the Diary. Oh well – at least someone's talking to me. "At least someone's having a bit of fun, so well done. All that remains, of course, is for Grimsby to finish the job and emphatically destroy Franchise Fuckwits FC and send their shameless rent-a-consumers back to Gridsville with their concrete tails between their stupid concrete legs. Indeed, I'm sorely tempted to go to the game myself to cheer you on. Sadly, I don't think I can. According to Channel 4's depiction of Bostonians last night, I'm just too fat, lazy, racist, bigoted, ignorant and retarded to possibly find my way to London." I didn't realise they'd relocated Hollyoaks, Pete. "And while we're on the theme of rampant obesity in south Lincolnshire, can you guess which current Boston United squad member this Barrow supporter was referring to last night when he said: 'The fattest player I have seen in 30 years'?" It wasn't Sam Gaughran, was it?

Tuesday 4 March
So! The day is here! In an epic match that is already being described as "being played tonight", Town take on Morecambe to decide who will face Bastard Franchise Scum FC in the Dulux Cup final at Wembley later this month. Wembley! WEMBLEY! It's a BIG GROUND! BIG! And everyone's GOING MAD! The Grimsby Telegraph is using headlines that sound like chapters from Mein Kampf. The Mariners' superb new official website seems to have published a story an hour or two ago headlined Town fans take over the Osmond, and then deleted it. And the BBC has recast Jones the Lump as a defender. CRAZY!

What's really happening with the Town team then? Nobody honestly has any idea, except, hopefully, Lord Alan Buckley, but the boss is giving nothing away. "I made a few changes at the weekend and it was a terrific performance," the manager reminds us. And? "The players who came in have certainly given me something to think about." Yes... so what are you thinking, Al? "Fortunately, apart from Ciaran, we have no new injury worries so it's good to have options." Options, yes... go on... "It keeps players on their toes when there are others waiting in the wings to perform – the likes of Peter Bore and Justin Whittle in particular did well on Saturday." And so it goes on, with the distance between Buckley's cards and chest never other than negligible. GAH!

Perhaps we'll have better luck with the attendance. Five days ago the SNOS was talking about a capacity crowd for tonight's game, which was always going to be an ambitious target, not least because nobody actually knows what the capacity at Blundell Park is from one season to the next. Suffice it to say that the crowd this evening will comfortably outstrip the paltry 3,200 who were rattling round Christie Park for the first leg last week (which included a large contingent of Town fans, of course). The Diary remains unsure as to how the Grimsby Telegraph concludes that "more than 6,000 people will be cheering the Mariners on tonight" from the evidence that "more than 1,500 tickets were sold up to 5pm yesterday", but I'm sure they wouldn't print it if it weren't true.

The last word before tonight's astonishing and dramatic encounter falls to Straight Peter Bore – the self-confessed heterosexual enigma who has yet to decide whether he wants to be the new John Oster or the new Graham Hockless. For all the mystery over what goes on in his head, SPB has given an impressively grounded interview in today's Telewag. Where next for the lad who scored twice last Saturday with his first start of the season? "Now I am looking to carry on working hard in training to give myself a chance of more games, and then take my chances." And the team's prospects between now and May? "We are not going to get carried away. We will stay disciplined and prepare right, like we do for every game. It has been a good day. We will see what comes on Tuesday, and we will carry on doing the same thing." Let's hope for once it really can be that simple. See yers.

Monday 3 March
'The right sort of headache' is one of those phrases you only ever hear in relation to association football. This is a shame, as it could be usefully applied in the wider world – signifying, perhaps, a temporary ailment that releases the sufferer from their responsibility to take part in some undesirable activity, such as work, domestic drudgery or parenting duties. It might equally denote a choice needing to be made where each option is equally attractive, such as whether to go to the pub, watch That Mitchell & Webb Look on the telly, or arse about on the internet doing nothing very much for an hour or two. It is the latter that closely approximates the phrase's use in football contexts, as is evidenced by Lord Alan Buckley's use of the phrase this morning. The Town boss is faced with a selection quandary going in to tomorrow evening's Dulux Cup clash with Morecambe – but after resting several players at the weekend only to see their replacements thrash the Shrimps four-nil on their own patch, it's a selection quandary of the entirely fluffy variety rather than the spiky death kind.

Naturally, many of the plaudits for Saturday's walkover are being laid at the shiny boots of Straight Peter Bore, whose rapid two-goal contribution in the first half set Town's juggernaut in motion. Unfortunately the tremendous performance of the practising heterosexual winger/forward has not been match by the club's superb new official website as it quotes the victorious manager. "He's got some much talent," are among the words attributed to Lord Buckley. "I'm fed up of speaking to Peter. He's got some much ability." Some much more than the staff on the SNOS, it would appear.

While he may be among the more enigmatic recent graduates of the Mariners' youth system, SPB is not this season's most successful (or at least not yet). This accolade would surely be contested by the level-headed likes of Danny North and Ryan Bennett, and the latter's swift development has been recognised by an award thing with a risibly convoluted corporate sponsor name. It basically means he's the best young player in the fourth division – which we all knew already, but it's always nice to see GTFC's young talent get the public acclaim they deserve. Or it will be until the summer, at any rate, when Bennett moves to Leeds for £12.95 and a packet of pork scratchings.

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