Cod Almighty | Diary
The retaineth it retaineth every day
20 May 2026
Lots of news today. I'll crack on.
Yesterday was of course retained list day, the day on which we discover which footballers we will never see wearing the black and white again. There were few surprises, but some sadness. Bonny Little George McEachran will be missed by all, as will JSB, a very talented footballer rufty-tuftied into extinction by fourth division defenders. Tyrell scored against Manchester United and performed the tackle of the season in the Sheff Wed game. Soonsup-Bell and Gilsenen looked like they wanted not to be rufty-tuftied into extinction by fourth division defenders and hence tried not to have too much contact with them. Our resurgence in 2026 was largely down to the fact that we finally got a forward with elbows, whose loan spell is over but that might not be the end of the elbow-fest. Hopefully.
Hopefully Jack Smithson will return, as will the Cookmeister, but who knows? We have the basis for a good squad of players next year. We'll buy who we buy, be it Duane Dibley, Clem Fandango or Hartley Hare. Forget about it. It's cricket season now. Get the pads out. What? It's raining? Bugger.
A simple rule in life is this: the more money is at stake, the more people will break the law and any moral or ethical codes to obtain it. Many people - in my view rather naively - think that the entertainment business, including football and popular music for example, are largely immune to shenanigans and tomfoolery at the highest level despite being billion dollar industries.
All of which leads me to the ugliest end to a football season I can remember for a long time. Two weeks ago in my diary I shared my view on Southampton, describing them as a horrible team after watching them try and cheat their way to victory against the Middlesboroughs. I shed no tears for their removal from the Championship playoffs, but shouldn't Hull be promoted automatically? Since when, if a team is thrown out of a cup competition, which the playoffs are, do we go back and reinstate someone who has already lost? Of course, Wembley needs a game. The food outlets there have probably already bought thousands of pizza slices at 5p each ready to sell for £25 each on the big day. You can't just shut down that kind of profit margin. I can understand the dilemna. I mean, I don't want to be seen to be supporting Hull in any way but I almost hope they win now. Plus, it will give us a thrilling Premiership next year as they and Ipswich fight it out for bottom place.
In other news, Celtic 'won' the Scottish title and Man City 'won' the FA Cup. Neither of these things have anything to do with the widespread corruption, shenanigans and tomfoolery I mentioned earlier. I wonder if Tottenham Hotspur will survive the threat of relegation?
Luckily the corruption, tomfoolery and shenanigans will soon come to an end as the famously law-abiding, sensible and honest FIFA will be throwing a World Cup Party in Trump's corruption-, tomfoolery- and shenanigan-free US of A. Oh good. One moment that always sticks in my mind was when an Argentinian player - whose name I can't be bothered to reasearch - blasted the ball at the Dutch subs' bench from close range during the World Cup quarter final, leading to a small riot. He was booked. Booked. It's a good job football is such an amazing game, otherwise I would have given it up by now due to an intense pain in the cynicism.
Right, as soon as the CA lawyers have gone through this with a fine-tooth comb - as opposed to the broad-toothed comb that never really took off as a concept - it'll be ready for your perusal. I've written three pages, so if it's any shorter than that you'll know a lot of it has been redacted.
The rain's stopped. Howzat!