Cod Almighty | Diary

Coin-operated boy

4 March 2022

It's BOTB here! I'm writing this on Thursday night because, remarkably, someone has offered me paid employment on Friday – a mistake people tend to make only once. You don't need to worry about topicality though, because if there is any GTFC news between now and then a crack team of CA editors have been lined up to insert it into my devastatingly wooden prose.

So Woking, eh? Expert, texpert, Woking smokers, don't you think the joker laughs at you? Whoah, BOTB. This is no place to be having psychedelic sixties flashbacks. There's a diary to write.

The Woke Snowflakes, to give them their correct nickname, apparently sacked manager Alan Dowson with a 20-second phone call on Monday night after a run of games in which they were a bit shit. Actually I've just replicated that phone call in my head and it only takes about three seconds to tell someone they are fired, so he should think himself lucky he got 17 seconds of small talk. If Alan Sugar had been Woking chairman he could have fired the manager and freed up those 17 seconds of his valuable time to invent crappy products and grow more beard over his walnut-textured craterchops.

Woking will therefore be managed by someone called Ian Dyer, which is about as generic a football name as I could imagine. I suspect every club in the top five divisions has someone called Ian Dyer somewhere on the staff. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that over 90 per cent of British groundsmen are called Ian Dyer. In my experience, playing teams who have just sacked their managers can go one of two ways. Either they play like haunted men, heavy-legged and flat-footed as their uncertain futures weigh on them, or they play like men recently released from jail because they can at last jettison the ex-manager's tactical numbskullery and play with freedom. We will find out tomorrow.

I'll be missing the second half, the first time this season life has got in the way of my Blundell Park adventures, and I'm very grumpy about it. When I was younger and lived away from the town I'd miss games left, right and centre and it would trouble me not, but these days I get very ratty without my fixture fix. Since I and everybody else missed a whole season not too long ago, you'd think I'd deal with it philosophically, but I know that when I head for the exit at 15.46 I’m going to feel like I'm walking out halfway through my own birthday party.

Retro Diary has missed one half of football at Blundell Park this season, the first half against Dover in which we scored five goals, and he still sounds off about it every few minutes. Since he and I have to leave early tomorrow for the same reason, a second-half goal-glut fiesta party will possibly push him over the edge. So, for the sake of his sanity, a few corkers in the first half and a non-event in the second would be ideal, lads, if you're reading.

The Woking press state that their local heroes are hoping to pull off an upset against in-form Grimsby. I suppose we are in form, though it still doesn't really feel like it. We're hardly riding the crest of a wave, are we? More like dragging ourselves out onto the beach after being bitten on the arse by a lobster. Still, the play-offs are looking a possibility, so all to play for, etc.

So that's me. As stated earlier, any topics of immediate importance will be added to the diary by the CA newshounds and editorial staff. Hopefully they'll add some jokes and facts as well. Thank you boys and girls!