Cod Almighty | Diary

We can't rewind, we've gone too far

9 June 2023

Well, what a to-do! I was going to spend this diary debating which was the worst acting performance of all time. In case you're interested, I concluded it was the little girl trying to act surprised in Buggles's Video Killed the Radio Star video – but then GTFC scuppered my plans by suddenly morphing into beast mode and buying players left right and centre. In June! In recent years our tactic has been the equivalent of rifling through the boxes of free stuff outside the hospice shop, but this year we are straight in there with a swagger and a debit card, like a kind of Freeman Street Paris Hilton.

After the purchase(!) of Broadway Danny Rose yesterday, Town watchers were shocked when another body entered the building, that of Rochdale defender Toby Mullarkey. Our two new signings look very similar, raising the possibility that our new recruitment policy is sticking a photofit profile outside the post office and seeing who the police bring in. I believe there are currently three Danny Roseseses plying their trade in the football league, as well as three Ben Davieseses. We need to start getting more unique names to the park, like Jamie Tartt and Moe Bumbercatch, though I doubt Richmond would let them go.

Both signings look like good ones on paper, but my inherited Grimsbyosity refuses to let me get too excited. Thanks to bedders78 on the Fishy whose first reaction to the Rose signing was "decent, but suggests Lloyd not returning" for summarising our beloved town's mentality of soggy chips with everything.

Rule change! Players are no longer allowed to dry the ball with a towel before throwing it onto the pitch. And we've gone MULTIBALL! To quote the EFL rulebook: "Match balls will be placed on cones in designated areas at pitch side to help increase the time of the ball being in play."

MULTIBALL! I'm so excited, and I just can't hide it. What I suspect will happen is the new ball-holding cones will become iconic and part of football folklore. What I can't see happening is the balls being knocked off the cones and causing MULTIBALL chaos. Younger fans reading this, I said optimistically, might be interested to know we used to have ball boys and girls whose job it was to retrieve the ball when it went out of play and return it to the nearest player. We still sometimes have these children, of course, but they now seem to have more of a watching brief. Will they sit next to the cones? Will the players collect the balls from the cones? Will time-wasting players accidentally kick the cones over causing MULTIBALL delay as the ball bobbles 20 feet away down the touchline, all the time being watched by a stationary child?

I can hardly wait for the start of the new season. Two new players, both of whom cost money, and now MULTIBALL. We are truly honoured to live in such times.