Cod Almighty | Diary

Put your xxxxxx card away, oh you xxxxx

11 February 2022

BOTB here, the man who puts the 'dire' in diary, ready to discuss football and societal issues in the most facile way, with poor jokes aplenty.

So, football hooligans, eh? By now you have probably seen The Times piece about our fans travelling to Notts County. Now, the thing about being quite old is that it does give you perspective. I've seen a lot of football games, I've met a lot of people, I've witnessed a fair amount of antisocial behaviour and I've read a fair bit of history too. A constant theme throughout is that drunk young men, especially in gangs, are absolute arseholes. Unsurprisingly, after two years of societal stress, upheaval and confinement, the arsehole element in society is keen to be out arseholing again. Honestly, I hate them. What can we do to stop them? I don't know. Prohibition? I'm teetotal. Wouldn't bother me. But, you know, liberty and things.

But I will say this. Imagine that society evolved to such a point that violence was unknown, that peace and tranquility reigned and we all got along with each other without war or friction. What would the media do? Would they proclaim there was no need for them any more as there wasn't any news left and all get jobs in florists, or would they create discord and division in order to give themselves something to write about? Let's face it, they would be out stirring the shit for all it was worth.

Basically, the stories that emerged from the piece were this: our arseholes left a train carriage in a bad way. One or two of our arseholes scared a disabled person. This is undeniably bad and shameful. But was it worthy of a creepy voiceover and the insinuation that we would all soon be murdered in our beds? "These young lads could become the next generation of football hooligans" intoned the narrator, on loan from the Addams family. I'm honestly more bothered that they might be the next generation of fly-tippers. Someone has to clear up your shit, you know, boys.

I really do think the line between crimes of selfishness and stupidity and crimes of malevolent intent needs to be more thickly drawn. The fans rushing toward the pitch didn't go with the objective of scaring disabled people. They just didn't think about it. The lads who left litter in the carriageways weren't trying to ruin anyone's day. They just didn't know what else to do with the bottles and they were too selfish and pissed to worry about it. Their intention was to get drunk and be happy. They are youthful, drunken, selfish, arseholes. But they aren't Fred West. And compared to what I saw at games in the last century, they were relatively peaceful.

Undoubtedly in their number would be the odd one who was actually malevolent, who wanted to hurt and intimidate and vandalise and destroy. These people have always been with us. It's why human societies have jails and courts and punishment. You just hope they get caught whilst young before they do any real damage. They are an ever-present pain in society's arse. They aren't specifically a Grimsby problem, or a football problem – they are just an indication that humanity is not flawless; it never has been and it never will be. Many of them will have hideously scarring backstories or psychological issues or substance abuse problems. If anyone knew what to do with them, save sending them to prison, we would have done it by now. I'm a diarist for a light-hearted GTFC website. I can barely get my tracksuit bottoms on the right way round in the morning. I once pointed my car keys at an orchid and pressed 'unlock'. No use expecting me to solve the problem of broken people.

Some games take more getting over than others. The King's Lynn Debacle – which would make a good name for a Sherlock Holmes story – has been much discussed in the past couple of days and there is little to add. I would say, though, that before the season started I listed my issues with non-league football, and bad referees and time-wasting were in the top three. Someone seriously has to get a grip – it is several years since we were last down here and most games are still effectively over from the 75th minute as whichever team is happiest with the scoreline simply lies down and pretends to be injured for the last fifteen. If the ball makes it into play they will try and win a throw-in which will take two minutes to take, all under the eyes of indulgent referees who would no doubt all talk like Mr. Barrowclough in Porridge if we could only but hear them.

Now then, Aldershot tomorrow. Which team will turn up? Don't say "Aldershot", I'm talking about us. Will it be the Tuesday tortoises, or the Saturday ...er....snakes? Shrews? I want to say hares really. But there's no alliteration. I like alliteration a lot.

Anyway, this is a diary, not War and Peace, I'd best cut it short before the TL;DR crowd gets bored.

UTM.