28/12 Peterborough 2nd Half

By: Tony Butcher
Date: 29/12/2003

NO changes were made by either team at half time, although Town did have a different attitude and had a real go for the first quarter of an hour. Anything you can do we can do better, for Cas has a long throw too and it isn’t a gloopy drooper than goes a long way slowly.

Peterborough United 0 Grimsby Town 0 28 Dec 2003, Nationwide League Division 2 It fizzed into the near post, Edwards headed on, Onoura turned and tried to lift a volley over the ‘keeper at the near post. Tyler just managed to punch the ball clear before Iffy’s boot made contact with a football for the first time since Christmas Day 1998. Pressure, pressure, the ball pinging around in front of Tyler, but never near him. Crosses, corners, Crane and Onuora marking each other out of the game, Onoura blocking a goalbound Crane header at the far post. Have Town forgotten how to pass, why to pass, to pass to score, to shoot, to do anything worthwhile. Sure Town had the ball, with Pouton trying, oh so trying, to calm play down, to bring some dignity to events. Unfortunately, his calming influence didn’t extend to his feet, as his passes were uniformly underhit, a contagious disease which spread to Jevons too. Or perhaps they are colour blind and can’t see blue shirts? Boulding? A dreadful game: weak, unperceptive, but he was the central character in the second big moan of the game. The ball was lifted over the top of the Peterborough defence, just right of centre. Arber and Boulding held hands, then had a little wrestle. Just as Boulding appeared to have rolled free, Arber’s left arm appeared as rigid as a juggernaut. Boulding ran into it, fell down clutching his face and the ball was kicked out of play. No free kick, and a collective shout at the ref and linesman. Some refs do, some refs don’t and this was a don’ter, or was I mishearing my fellow Grimbarians? Do you really need to know about Cas’s volley which drumbled through the penalty area, well wide? It was more of a shot than his effort in the first half, and that’s just about all you could say about it. Is it possible to be bored to death? Peterborough, what were they doing? Nothing. I can’t remember Davison touching the ball in the first part of the second half. They did have some long throws though, which filled even their fans with inertia. Trying to remember this game is like staring into the abyss, is there anything in there? Will I come out the other side a sane man? Wahey, at last something to talk about. Fry took off his rubbish third division strikers after 67 minutes, replacing them with the octogenarian Clarke and Fotiades, and then going to a three man strike force. Straight away this almost brought dividends as Town should have scored. Jevons won the ball and played a superb little pass through to Onuora. Yeah, like Iffy’ll race clear like a hare, a gazelle, or maybe a one legged hippopotamus. Surprisingly, a defender managed to get back and slide the ball away from the big man, but only back to Jevons, near the edge of the area, who again released the tiger. Roar, paw, poor, Onuora tripped over the ball and managed to knock it sideways to Boulding, about 15 yards out to the left of goal. Boulding’s shot was deflected across the area. Jevons strode forward and filled the void, side-footing a shot towards the top left hand corner of the goal. The ball hit a defender in the face and spun a yard wide of the left hand post. A right Keystone Cops hashing by both teams.

Grimsby Davison Cas Crane Edwards Young Campbell Hamilton Pouton Jevons Onuora Boulding   Subs Ford 84 mins Mansaram 82 mins McDermott Anderson Groves   Attendance 5,245   Referee Andy Penn (West Midlands)   Division Two League Table Reports/Fixtures Squad Stats Top Scorers Previews Predict-o-Meter   Man of the Match Vote for your Man of the Match Your Name (optional) Your Email Address (optional) Your Man of the Match Pick a player Davison Cas Crane Young Ford Edwards Campbell Hamilton Pouton Jevons Onuora Mansaram Boulding Nominations count towards the Player Of The Month shortlist.

The game was not so much drifting to 0-0, but set in quick drying concrete, with steel girders for support, with superglue affixing the deep piles driven into the ground. And on days like these don’t you just know Town’lll mess it up with a calamitous bit of slapdashery. Hello Des! Town indulged themselves in some passing between the defenders, across the back line, to Young, to Pouton, who noticed Des free on the halfway line. Hamilton decided to knock the ball back to Edwards first time. As Edwards controlled the fire encrusted meteor, a striker ran from behind him, and nicked the ball to Farrell, near the half way line on their right. Farrell zoomed clear towards goal, Edwards got back and half stopped him near the corner of the penalty area. Farrell stepped inside Edwards, then another defender and was free with just Davison between him and unlikely glory. Farrell seized the moment and thwacked a right footed drive around Davison, over and wide of the top right hand corner. Nice to see you, to see you nice. Didn’t he do well?

This was their chance. Full stop. That was it. Clarke did manage to burst clear a couple of minutes later but shot straight at Davison from a narrow angle. It didn’t look particularly interesting from 100 yards away. And they flung a few crosses into the crowd too. Did I mention those long throws? The Poshites nearly scored from one, you know, when Cas flicked on towards the right hand corner. Davison slowly sailed to plunge upon this stray cat. But the sum total of the Poshies was a few more chucks, some rubbish corners, some barging, and some dribbling from Farrell. It all explained why they are down at the bottom. Fortunately, Fry didn’t think to bring on Newton, who relishes Town full backs.

Town had the better chances to do something wonderful, but failed every time. The nearest and dearest of these knocking opportunities was our old friend Michaelmas Boulding. Hamilton, in the centre of the pitch, did a bicycle kick to lift the ball over the top. Boulding got in front of the defender and was free, bearing down on goal from the centre right. From about a dozen yards out and just wide of goal, Boulding mumbled a soft right footed shot straight into the ‘keeper’s arms. Anymore, yep. Boulding again, sent freeish on the right, wriggling past a defender, had a shot blocked from a narrow angle and the ball bounced back to him. With Pouton and friends queuing up unmarked inside the area, Boulding dragged a first time shot against the first defender’s shins. Pouton walked over and told Boulding off. Oh I forgot, Young was replaced by Ford with 15 minutes left, just after he’d received some treatment for something or other. Ford wasn’t noticeable, so this suggests that he didn’t make any monumental errors. But then again, who’d have noticed, who’d have cared. Brains were being sucked out of heads by the sheer tedium of the torpid trash in front of us.

Sometime during the afternoon Campbell tried a Childsian volley as the ball dropped from the stars. His cross shot zoomed low through the area and was volleyed clear by a defender a few yards out. Finally, the vocal minority got the thing they wanted, Onoura was replaced by Mansaram with just less than 10 minutes left. Mansaram was Mansaramian, all enthusiastic bundling, good, bad and ugly in the some movement. A wonderful chase down of a chip into the right hand corner, robbing the defender then...passing directly to the next one, 5 yards away. At the end Town won a free kick near the left hand corner of the Peterborough penalty area. No Barnard, no Anderson, so only Jevons to take it. Everyone in the ground knew where the ball was going, and Jevons duly curled it around the wall and into the side netting, causing an unnecessary frisson of excitement in those Town fans rattling their jewellery in the seats at the side.

There were five minutes of added time, and after a couple, to a chorus of indifference, the referee gave up and ended the game. Oh, and the obligatory daft booking for Crane. Injured when clearing and receiving treatment off the pitch when Legg hurled a mighty arrow into the centre, Crane ran back on and tackled Legg as he picked up the clearance. Seems the referee hadn’t allowed him to come back, so a yellow card was wafted.

Sometimes you can have too much information, and if you’ve got this far, you have. All you needed to know about this game were these three words - long throw, offside. Peterborough were dreadful, without any style or wit, yet Town managed to match them. It’s games like these which show why Town won’t go down, but won’t go up either. For they lack the will to win, to be ruthless, to be professional. Or perhaps the win bonuses aren’t that generous, or take the payers into a higher tax bracket; the cost/benefit analysis falling on the side of "why bother".

It was like watching a schoolboy game.

Nicko’s Man of the Match

No-one outside the defence did anything worthy, though at least Pouton tried to do things properly. Edwards, the Farrell robbing moment aside, was an unobtrusive rock, though overall the only Town player to enhance his standing in world football was Greg Young, who looked confident and competent, even causing minor peril to Peterborough when striding forward.

Official Warning

Mr Penn. Determined not to make a life changing decision, such as moving to Australia or sending someone off, he was a bit of a cowardly green custard. Was he a homer, or just afraid to do something which might make people shout at him? Arbitrary and mostly arbitrary against Town, he wasn’t awful, just average for this division. There have been worse this year, he gets a 4.872.

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