Cod Almighty | Diary

Naughty, naughty, very naughty

5 January 2026

Town have retained their one hundred percent win record in 2026 after yesterday’s match at Cambridge was postponed. That figure would’ve likely come in for a stern test against a side whose defence embodies all the qualities of a pre-Christmas Scrooge.

Yes, it’s still Christmas, would you believe! Twelve drummers are supposedly drumming today, and your West Yorkshire Diary is badly in need of an epiphany tomorrow to solve a work-related shenanigan. But that’s tomorrow’s non-Christmas problem, for non-Christmas people.

The Mariners have had an ever-so-good (an Ebeneezer Goode) Christmas, when you think about it. There’s me, giving credit to Cambridge’s miserly defence when it is, in fact, Town’s back line that has been the stingiest of all during the season of eating your own weight in butter. First team management will play it down, of course, but the biggest gift we got was Jackson Smith from ey-up Barnsleh. Given what was happening before he signed on successive seven-day emergency loan deals, it’s difficult to know if he’s amazing or just very competent.

Back-to-back wins and a hat-trick of clean sheets have certainly helped to lift the mood among the fans, although all it takes is a few days of not signing anyone for the mood to be dragged back down a little by the type of fans who say they hate the Sky Sports transfer hype but then buy into it.

Things aren’t built to last. Our TV started going all weird on us the other week, so we’ve had to buy a new one. My parents used to know a TV repair man, but they’re extinct now. The culture seems to be: if it’s not working, get a new one. And it’s bled into football.

Maybe it’s just me and, hey, maybe I’m being radical, but wouldn’t it be nice if we worked with what we got this January? This is the squad Dave Artell assembled in the summer. It defeated Man Utd and took us top of the league for a few hours, so maybe all our managerial maestros need to do is eke out that latent potential? You know, weave a bit of man-management magic with what already exists within the building?

What happened to coaching and improving players? Where are the on-field partnerships, the telepathic interchanges that unlock a stubborn defence? Everyone playing rotating triangular systems with rotating triangular squads probably doesn’t help with that.

Last time I looked, Kabia had 10 goals for the season. Not bad for a lad who stepped up two divisions and has been asked to play centrally against fourth division bullies.

Are we to toss that aside? Is that it for Rose, then? And if we do by some miracle sign a central striker who can score more frequently than our current crop, where does that leave Soonsup-Bell, or Cam Gardner when he’s back fit? Perhaps, what we need are a few more goals from elsewhere in the team. Maybe, we need to see more from the Amaluzors, the Burns, and the Gilsenans of this world. A great philosopher once wrote that the answer usually lies much closer to home than you realise.

The winless run that took us almost to Christmas was frustrating, but I never felt anything was amiss or fundamentally broken — not with good people steering the ship. A similar run under previous ownership would’ve left me feeling differently. When you’re rotten on the inside, it’s usually only a matter of time before you begin to see it on the outside.

But our insides are relatively healthy these days, full of fibrous goodness, giving us the perfect conditions to grow. Add in a bit of sun and sea air and we’ll soon find ourselves talking excitedly about chasing down that play-off pack.

First, we have the small matter of the FA Cup third round to attend to. A potential £121,500 awaits the winners plus a juicy fourth round tie, probably at Port Vale. If that sounds vastly unspectacular, then we’ll know exactly how Weston-super-Mare fans felt when they saw they’d drawn us.

The bad weather looks like it’s going to hang around for a while. If we found yesterday a little inconvenient, imagine travelling all the way from North Somerset to find the game has been called off because of a frozen patch of pitch in front of a frozen horse beer stand.

Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Enjoy your week, stay warm and UTM!