One Game at a Time:
Grimsby Town (FA Cup 1st Round) November 5th (A)
In the end then Exeter came and did what they have frequently done this season. Shipped four goals. Whilst that doesn’t tell the whole story of a game played in squally rain driven conditions Argyle’s record breaking ninth consecutive league home win means they have a perfect twenty-seven points from home games, nine and ten more respectively than the current closest chasers from their home matches (albeit Ipswich have played a game less the Argyle and the Wendies).
Serving up a feast of entertainment on Halloween for Sky, Argyle overcame “spirited’ resistance from the aptly nicknamed “six toes” from up the A38, after two defensive horror shows by Mumba and then Scarr were quickly punished by the spritely and impish Stansfield who was a handful all evening. He twice set up goals that gave the Greasy Ones the lead, but a classy set up by Randell and finish by Whitaker, followed by a simply sublime thirty-five-yard silver bullet from Mumba past the ‘Where Keeper” (as in where was he?) sent the game into Shuey Time all square.
Hardie for Ennis led to two crisp two touch finished from subtle through balls from the impressive Whitaker, and the most dangerous score in football, well at least if you live in Suffolk, was comfortably ridden out.
The final act of magic was a Spell of Silence that fell over the travelling supporters, who to be fair up until then had contributed to a cracking and crackling atmosphere, and the whistle from an excellent refereeing performance by Charles Breakspear was lost in a roar that would have made Jack Leslie smile.
The win, which leaves Argyle four points clear of second, seven away from third and a mere nine away from the “safety” of fifty points was all the sweeter for the fact that after ninety-four minutes of the Saturday game for closest rival Ipswich, they too held a comfortable four two lead at improving Charlton. Step forward agent Walton, who, having already performed above and beyond his undercover duties to haul the Addicks back into the game with two flappy saves that were both tucked away, picked the perfect spot off his line to allow the looping header that made it four-four to arc gently over him. All this in the time partly added on due to agent Ladapo ambling over to make sure the Ipswich travelling support could read his name on the back of his shirt after he scored to give them the lead. Once a green eh Freddie.
The only bad news of the week was the absence of injured Finn Azaz, who will be missing for a while. In home match terms so will Argyle, as this week sees the first round of the FA Cup. I don’t know if Dion Dublin was aware of the prominence of the famed Sparksy quote to “suck on that” but he did us no favours by hauling ball 35 out to grant us the deep and fervent joy of a trip to Cleethorpes to play Grimsby Town. Combined with trips to Lincoln and Burton Albion, Argyle will be on the road for all of November, barring a favourable draw at home, assuming we get that far, for Round 2, or else it’s the Papa Johns for a home fans portion of Greens.
One of Argyles more occasional opponents, we have only met the Mariners (no relation) once before in the cup, scraping a one nil home win in 2017. Despite Argyle being the top seeded club in the draw, the game was not enticing enough to tempt the TV channels to take a punt on an upset. It will be telling to look at the team selection to see how high up the Argyle priority list a cup run is. Given the fortune income that can be derived from a decent run expect a strong side, but no-one would be very surprised to see assets like Mumba and Whitaker given a rest, and some game time for the emerging Academy talent like Issaka, Jenkins-Davies and maybe even Edworthy Jr at some point.
The club itself came into being in 1878, as so often in those days, as a means of occupying the winter attentions of itinerant cricketers and keeping them out of the pub. Originally called Grimsby Pelham, after the local landowner’s family name, the name was quickly changed to Grimsby Town, perhaps because of a paucity of witty chants that rhymed with Pelham that didn’t include Smell’em.
The club eventually joined the Football League when it expanded to two divisions and early in the Twentieth Century achieved their first promotion. They were subsequently relegated in controversial circumstances when an alleged conspiracy of Lancashire clubs contrived to send them down. Despite the resulting suspension of a Blackburn Rovers official for life, the relegation was allowed to stand.
Whether it was the prospect of travelling to the other side of the Pennines that triggered this conspiracy, or a fear for their players lives is unknown. What is known is that Grimsby Town had been the first club to kill an opposing player on the pitch when in 1889 a Staveley FC player, William Cropper, was accidently kicked in the stomach by Town full back Doyle, dying a day later. Cropper was a former Derbyshire cricketer who apparently didn’t even particularly enjoy playing football.
Doyle was a Scottish player of no small repute, but one blessed with a hot temper, described as having a weathervane of a brain, likely to go off in any direction. The clash with Cropper was ruled accidental at the coroner’s inquest into his death, something later referred to in the press about Doyle as a testimonial to the fairness of his play, which was somewhat condemnatory. Pastime magazine, an English sports magazine, said of Doyle, ‘He is undoubtedly able to play a scrupulously fair game for he has received unsolicited testimonials to this effect from coroners’ juries. On the other hand, he has certainly the power of taking care of himself in the melee, as the disasters which have befallen those who have come into collision with him amply testify.’ Ouch. Not even Francis Benali got that amount of praise.
Town had their first experience of relegation when they failed to gain re-election to the league in 1910. This failed re-election was claimed by Cod Almighty, the Grimsby Town fan site as for being for crimes against fashion, as the club had changed from its original blue and white stripes to chocolate and blue quarters and then to salmon pink as their strip colour. The monochrome Black and White stripes arrived in 1925.
They were to return to the League almost immediately, somewhat satisfyingly at the expense of Lincolnshire rivals Lincoln City, with whom according to legend they share an Imp.
After the war interruption they joined the expanded football league for its inaugural season, sharing two draws with Argyle in 1920/1, before being moved to the newly formed Division 3 North the following year. Even if these were the golden years for Town, reaching Division 1 in 1929 and an FA Cup semi-final in 1936 where they lost to a Bastin goal for Arsenal, the club has never achieved a huge amount on the field. Indeed, they rank 26th best of all the clubs to have played in the Northern division. However, courtesy of their single season in the Southern Division they rate bang last in Division 3 South.
Their second Cup semi-final in 1939 was a comprehensive five nil defeat at the hand of Wolves, as having lost a player to injury in the days before substitutes, they were unable to keep the Wolves at bay.
There was in that pre second world war period however the not insignificant achievement of defeating Manchester United 7-3 on Boxing Day having won at Old Trafford on Christmas Day by 3-1 in 1933. For several months afterwards the terraces of Old Trafford were adorned by hundreds of school children in freshly purchased Grimsby shirts. Well, it’s a nice idea, isn’t it.
Playing in Christmas Day was no oddity for Town as they and Hull City for many years were the only two clubs granted dispensation to do so, because of the needs of the fishing industry.
The club is interwoven with this industry, hardly surprisingly as at one point the 400 trawlers that operated from the port formed the world’s largest fishing fleet. The clubs first sponsor was Findus and its mascots including Mighty Mariner reflected the bright yellow weatherproof gear of the fisherman at one stage. The mascot Harry the Haddock which had its heyday in the days of inflatables when in 1989 thousands were waved in a three one FA Cup defeat at Plough Lane. The great irony was of course that the inflatables themselves depicted not a Haddock but a Rainbow Trout. One of the tragedies of football is that there has been a player called Harry Haddock but he never made it south of the border, playing his entire career at Clyde. Obviously, he was a freshwater Haddock.
In the early 1950’s the club was managed by Bill Shankly, later to find fame at Liverpool, who led them to promotion. He left, citing the failure of the Board to back him financially for the heady heights of Workington, and was replaced by, somewhat surprisingly, a Hungarian manager, Elemir Bekessy.
Arriving through the auspices of Aston Villa’s Jimmy Hogan, the Hungarian who spoke little English was the first ever foreign manager to be appointed to the English League, and perhaps foreshadowing the politics of the area to come many years later with Brexit, quickly fell foul of work permit requirements and so lasted a matter of weeks. His methods were ahead of his time, focussing on balance and agility as well as controversially, as reported by the Grimsby Telegraph, “ball practice was widely used.”
If hiring a foreign manager seemed revolutionary, it is perhaps remarkable that Grimsby director Arthur Drewry was to rise to become one of the most influential men in World Football, eventually becoming FIFA President in 1955.
Drewry, through his roles at the FA, had been instrumental in both the joining of FIFA by the home nations, securing England a permanent seat at the top table of football, and the abandonment of England’s isolationist attitude to the World Cup. He also presided over the team selection for the 1-0 defeat if England by USA at Belo Horizante in 1950, which eliminated them from the competition, by leaving their best player, Stan Matthews on the bench, saving him for later games that never as a result materialised. His single word comment to the press of “Unbelievable,” predating Chris Kamara by about sixty years, was repeated as a headline across the UK.
Having learnt French as a POW in Turkey he became Jules Rimet’s deputy, succeeding him in 1955. A progressive, he advocated for bonus points for goals, the introduction of substitutes, organised the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, where he presented the trophy to Brazil, and was instrumental in the award of the 1966 World Cup to England. Sadly, the man who amongst other things, also chaired the fund raising for the Munich Disaster appeal in 1958, died before the event was staged, being succeeded by his friend Sir Stanley Rous.
He also had to deal with such political controversies as China leaving FIFA over Taiwan, and all this for expenses, with not a penny in salary. Times have changed.
After being managed by Shankly, the next name most associated with Grimsby was Lawrie McMenemy, whose main success was at Southampton, but whose single season promotion at Blundell Park got him a restaurant named after him. Other managers we will have heard of included Johnny Newman, jobbing caretaker manager Lennie Lawrence, who was renowned for the high turnover of players in his time there, Nicky Law, and the most recent port of call for Ian Holloway before a falling out with the owners resulted in his abrupt departure, now replaced by ex-Shrewsbury and Ipswich manager Paul Hurst.
Newman’s departure after winning promotion, to Derby County followed a familiar theme as once again the Board failed to support their manager, this time over a £30,000 fee for a little-known young Leicester City striker. Luckily for Grimsby no-one ever saw or heard of Gary Lineker again, so no harm done.
With a couple more spells out of the League in the late 2010’s our most recent interactions were the final game of the Adams promotion season, when a first minute goal and tenacious defensive display earned Town a draw and cost us the Championship Trophy, in favour of Pompous. Then they were one of two back-to-back 3-0 home wins in the Covid interrupted season that helped us gain promotion back to our current level.
Whilst Ian Hollow-words may have moved on we might get to refresh our acquaintance with Ryan Taylor, glass ankles permitting. He helped defeat the Hollywood stars of Wrexham in a stunning 5-4 win at the Racecourse to deny Ryan Reynolds and co a trip to the National league Play Off final.
Last season’s FA Cup run was instrumental in this season’s fine start. Rochdale was the last game of the Lowe era. Games at Birmingham and unforgettably at Chelsea showed that the Pilgrims had something about them, under their new coach.
This season’s start means that perhaps the FA Cup will be less of a priority, and yet could still be an important steppingstone in the journey of some of the newer names we have yet to have grown used to cheering on.
The thousand delights of Grimsby (c Bernie Taupin/ Elton John) are almost upon us.
But after Monday night we finally see our future lies along the green bricked road.
COYG!!
Grimsby Town (FA Cup 1st Round) November 5th (A)
In the end then Exeter came and did what they have frequently done this season. Shipped four goals. Whilst that doesn’t tell the whole story of a game played in squally rain driven conditions Argyle’s record breaking ninth consecutive league home win means they have a perfect twenty-seven points from home games, nine and ten more respectively than the current closest chasers from their home matches (albeit Ipswich have played a game less the Argyle and the Wendies).
Serving up a feast of entertainment on Halloween for Sky, Argyle overcame “spirited’ resistance from the aptly nicknamed “six toes” from up the A38, after two defensive horror shows by Mumba and then Scarr were quickly punished by the spritely and impish Stansfield who was a handful all evening. He twice set up goals that gave the Greasy Ones the lead, but a classy set up by Randell and finish by Whitaker, followed by a simply sublime thirty-five-yard silver bullet from Mumba past the ‘Where Keeper” (as in where was he?) sent the game into Shuey Time all square.
Hardie for Ennis led to two crisp two touch finished from subtle through balls from the impressive Whitaker, and the most dangerous score in football, well at least if you live in Suffolk, was comfortably ridden out.
The final act of magic was a Spell of Silence that fell over the travelling supporters, who to be fair up until then had contributed to a cracking and crackling atmosphere, and the whistle from an excellent refereeing performance by Charles Breakspear was lost in a roar that would have made Jack Leslie smile.
The win, which leaves Argyle four points clear of second, seven away from third and a mere nine away from the “safety” of fifty points was all the sweeter for the fact that after ninety-four minutes of the Saturday game for closest rival Ipswich, they too held a comfortable four two lead at improving Charlton. Step forward agent Walton, who, having already performed above and beyond his undercover duties to haul the Addicks back into the game with two flappy saves that were both tucked away, picked the perfect spot off his line to allow the looping header that made it four-four to arc gently over him. All this in the time partly added on due to agent Ladapo ambling over to make sure the Ipswich travelling support could read his name on the back of his shirt after he scored to give them the lead. Once a green eh Freddie.
The only bad news of the week was the absence of injured Finn Azaz, who will be missing for a while. In home match terms so will Argyle, as this week sees the first round of the FA Cup. I don’t know if Dion Dublin was aware of the prominence of the famed Sparksy quote to “suck on that” but he did us no favours by hauling ball 35 out to grant us the deep and fervent joy of a trip to Cleethorpes to play Grimsby Town. Combined with trips to Lincoln and Burton Albion, Argyle will be on the road for all of November, barring a favourable draw at home, assuming we get that far, for Round 2, or else it’s the Papa Johns for a home fans portion of Greens.
One of Argyles more occasional opponents, we have only met the Mariners (no relation) once before in the cup, scraping a one nil home win in 2017. Despite Argyle being the top seeded club in the draw, the game was not enticing enough to tempt the TV channels to take a punt on an upset. It will be telling to look at the team selection to see how high up the Argyle priority list a cup run is. Given the fortune income that can be derived from a decent run expect a strong side, but no-one would be very surprised to see assets like Mumba and Whitaker given a rest, and some game time for the emerging Academy talent like Issaka, Jenkins-Davies and maybe even Edworthy Jr at some point.
The club itself came into being in 1878, as so often in those days, as a means of occupying the winter attentions of itinerant cricketers and keeping them out of the pub. Originally called Grimsby Pelham, after the local landowner’s family name, the name was quickly changed to Grimsby Town, perhaps because of a paucity of witty chants that rhymed with Pelham that didn’t include Smell’em.
The club eventually joined the Football League when it expanded to two divisions and early in the Twentieth Century achieved their first promotion. They were subsequently relegated in controversial circumstances when an alleged conspiracy of Lancashire clubs contrived to send them down. Despite the resulting suspension of a Blackburn Rovers official for life, the relegation was allowed to stand.
Whether it was the prospect of travelling to the other side of the Pennines that triggered this conspiracy, or a fear for their players lives is unknown. What is known is that Grimsby Town had been the first club to kill an opposing player on the pitch when in 1889 a Staveley FC player, William Cropper, was accidently kicked in the stomach by Town full back Doyle, dying a day later. Cropper was a former Derbyshire cricketer who apparently didn’t even particularly enjoy playing football.
Doyle was a Scottish player of no small repute, but one blessed with a hot temper, described as having a weathervane of a brain, likely to go off in any direction. The clash with Cropper was ruled accidental at the coroner’s inquest into his death, something later referred to in the press about Doyle as a testimonial to the fairness of his play, which was somewhat condemnatory. Pastime magazine, an English sports magazine, said of Doyle, ‘He is undoubtedly able to play a scrupulously fair game for he has received unsolicited testimonials to this effect from coroners’ juries. On the other hand, he has certainly the power of taking care of himself in the melee, as the disasters which have befallen those who have come into collision with him amply testify.’ Ouch. Not even Francis Benali got that amount of praise.
Town had their first experience of relegation when they failed to gain re-election to the league in 1910. This failed re-election was claimed by Cod Almighty, the Grimsby Town fan site as for being for crimes against fashion, as the club had changed from its original blue and white stripes to chocolate and blue quarters and then to salmon pink as their strip colour. The monochrome Black and White stripes arrived in 1925.
They were to return to the League almost immediately, somewhat satisfyingly at the expense of Lincolnshire rivals Lincoln City, with whom according to legend they share an Imp.
After the war interruption they joined the expanded football league for its inaugural season, sharing two draws with Argyle in 1920/1, before being moved to the newly formed Division 3 North the following year. Even if these were the golden years for Town, reaching Division 1 in 1929 and an FA Cup semi-final in 1936 where they lost to a Bastin goal for Arsenal, the club has never achieved a huge amount on the field. Indeed, they rank 26th best of all the clubs to have played in the Northern division. However, courtesy of their single season in the Southern Division they rate bang last in Division 3 South.
Their second Cup semi-final in 1939 was a comprehensive five nil defeat at the hand of Wolves, as having lost a player to injury in the days before substitutes, they were unable to keep the Wolves at bay.
There was in that pre second world war period however the not insignificant achievement of defeating Manchester United 7-3 on Boxing Day having won at Old Trafford on Christmas Day by 3-1 in 1933. For several months afterwards the terraces of Old Trafford were adorned by hundreds of school children in freshly purchased Grimsby shirts. Well, it’s a nice idea, isn’t it.
Playing in Christmas Day was no oddity for Town as they and Hull City for many years were the only two clubs granted dispensation to do so, because of the needs of the fishing industry.
The club is interwoven with this industry, hardly surprisingly as at one point the 400 trawlers that operated from the port formed the world’s largest fishing fleet. The clubs first sponsor was Findus and its mascots including Mighty Mariner reflected the bright yellow weatherproof gear of the fisherman at one stage. The mascot Harry the Haddock which had its heyday in the days of inflatables when in 1989 thousands were waved in a three one FA Cup defeat at Plough Lane. The great irony was of course that the inflatables themselves depicted not a Haddock but a Rainbow Trout. One of the tragedies of football is that there has been a player called Harry Haddock but he never made it south of the border, playing his entire career at Clyde. Obviously, he was a freshwater Haddock.
In the early 1950’s the club was managed by Bill Shankly, later to find fame at Liverpool, who led them to promotion. He left, citing the failure of the Board to back him financially for the heady heights of Workington, and was replaced by, somewhat surprisingly, a Hungarian manager, Elemir Bekessy.
Arriving through the auspices of Aston Villa’s Jimmy Hogan, the Hungarian who spoke little English was the first ever foreign manager to be appointed to the English League, and perhaps foreshadowing the politics of the area to come many years later with Brexit, quickly fell foul of work permit requirements and so lasted a matter of weeks. His methods were ahead of his time, focussing on balance and agility as well as controversially, as reported by the Grimsby Telegraph, “ball practice was widely used.”
If hiring a foreign manager seemed revolutionary, it is perhaps remarkable that Grimsby director Arthur Drewry was to rise to become one of the most influential men in World Football, eventually becoming FIFA President in 1955.
Drewry, through his roles at the FA, had been instrumental in both the joining of FIFA by the home nations, securing England a permanent seat at the top table of football, and the abandonment of England’s isolationist attitude to the World Cup. He also presided over the team selection for the 1-0 defeat if England by USA at Belo Horizante in 1950, which eliminated them from the competition, by leaving their best player, Stan Matthews on the bench, saving him for later games that never as a result materialised. His single word comment to the press of “Unbelievable,” predating Chris Kamara by about sixty years, was repeated as a headline across the UK.
Having learnt French as a POW in Turkey he became Jules Rimet’s deputy, succeeding him in 1955. A progressive, he advocated for bonus points for goals, the introduction of substitutes, organised the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, where he presented the trophy to Brazil, and was instrumental in the award of the 1966 World Cup to England. Sadly, the man who amongst other things, also chaired the fund raising for the Munich Disaster appeal in 1958, died before the event was staged, being succeeded by his friend Sir Stanley Rous.
He also had to deal with such political controversies as China leaving FIFA over Taiwan, and all this for expenses, with not a penny in salary. Times have changed.
After being managed by Shankly, the next name most associated with Grimsby was Lawrie McMenemy, whose main success was at Southampton, but whose single season promotion at Blundell Park got him a restaurant named after him. Other managers we will have heard of included Johnny Newman, jobbing caretaker manager Lennie Lawrence, who was renowned for the high turnover of players in his time there, Nicky Law, and the most recent port of call for Ian Holloway before a falling out with the owners resulted in his abrupt departure, now replaced by ex-Shrewsbury and Ipswich manager Paul Hurst.
Newman’s departure after winning promotion, to Derby County followed a familiar theme as once again the Board failed to support their manager, this time over a £30,000 fee for a little-known young Leicester City striker. Luckily for Grimsby no-one ever saw or heard of Gary Lineker again, so no harm done.
With a couple more spells out of the League in the late 2010’s our most recent interactions were the final game of the Adams promotion season, when a first minute goal and tenacious defensive display earned Town a draw and cost us the Championship Trophy, in favour of Pompous. Then they were one of two back-to-back 3-0 home wins in the Covid interrupted season that helped us gain promotion back to our current level.
Whilst Ian Hollow-words may have moved on we might get to refresh our acquaintance with Ryan Taylor, glass ankles permitting. He helped defeat the Hollywood stars of Wrexham in a stunning 5-4 win at the Racecourse to deny Ryan Reynolds and co a trip to the National league Play Off final.
Last season’s FA Cup run was instrumental in this season’s fine start. Rochdale was the last game of the Lowe era. Games at Birmingham and unforgettably at Chelsea showed that the Pilgrims had something about them, under their new coach.
This season’s start means that perhaps the FA Cup will be less of a priority, and yet could still be an important steppingstone in the journey of some of the newer names we have yet to have grown used to cheering on.
The thousand delights of Grimsby (c Bernie Taupin/ Elton John) are almost upon us.
But after Monday night we finally see our future lies along the green bricked road.
COYG!!
