Cod Almighty | Diary

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28 March 2025

Your A46 Diary writes to you on a matchday! Very exciting. Artell has declared tonight's fixture against Colchester is a "corker". I put you through gratuitous alliteration last week, so no need for a repeat here, but there's a tabloid headline waiting to write itself.

Just like Artell's interviews in the last few weeks/months/decades:

"Injuries, Dave?"

"Yeah, lots."

"What's happening with them?"

"Scans, scans, scans!"

"Anyone close to making the squad for [insert opponent's name]?"

"Not telling you."

Might an Obikwu or a McJannet emerge from the darkness of DA's coyness? Unlikely. We have got Turi back, though, and that's sweet news. Perhaps tonight will see us with a first double pivot of the modest but never meagre McEachran and the unflappably fabulous Faroese. That would mean dropping either Khouri or Green and whoever is left playing deeper. Not immediately a bad thing, perhaps, as Barrington/Luker could then play in a more comfortable and/or familiar role behind Rose.

I would worry about isolation for Rose in such a situation, but Colchester are no mugs, so the double screen could be just the ticket. It may even mean we revert to Artell's preferred four at the back, allowing Svanthorsson to push forward and another start for Burns in a 4-2-3-1. That idea does give me a little frisson of anticipation as it would surely mean a Rose less isolated than in a regular 4-3-3. But, as we've seen so often over the years, the Cowleys' boys will be tough.

The Cowleys. I called myself A46 Diary because for years I worked at schools in Lincoln and so plied the potholes day after day to try and teach some Impish yoots a bit of literature. I spent several of those years being told that the best thing in life is to "feed the Rhead" and that the Cowleys were the second and third coming, the new Adams who would never be turned by traitorous Eves, the Bezos and Gates of footballing revolutions, the Cheech and Chong of training ground relaxation, the James and the Brown of hardest working men in entertainment.

They didn't put it quite like that, of course. More like, "Sir! Grimsby are rubbish, Sir! And the Cowleys are gonna get ya! And Rhead's gonna get ya! Yaaaaaahhhhhh!" Followed by, "Feed the Rhead! Feed the Rhead! Feed the Rhead!"

Ah, memories.

The Cowleys have given us a real mix of pleasure and pain over the years, right back to their Braintree days. They're a duo that seem to always beat us, but it was they who were beaten in our 2016 play-off semi. Sadly, it was also they who stopped our fine run of results against Lincoln, a sequence that had given me so much joy I was taken aside by a senior colleague and told to calm down as some of the pupils were becoming genuinely upset. Teachers can be puerile too, you know.

So, on the whole, we do not do well against them and their team is top of the form table with five wins in the last six. Yes, they did lose to Bradford last week but at home they're solid as a Roman rock, not losing at the JobServe Community Stadium since the New Year and, after that poor start to 2025, picking up wins against Walsall, Port Vale and Chesterfield. Wimbledon couldn't beat them and neither could Notts County. The odds seem to be against us - just the way we like it at the business end of the season.

We're now firmly in the 'one game at a time' period. Eight cup finals, eight games to prove ourselves, eight games to right the wrongs of the past, etc. It's hard not to be a little giddy on days like today. A win tonight puts us four points clear of seventh and piles the pressure on a misfiring Crewe. On form, however, it will be tonight's opponents that are most likely to push us to the end, so it's a proper six-pointer – and we owe them for one of the poorer games at BP this season. Into 'em, Town!