11/11 Macclesfield 2nd Half

By: Tony Butcher
Date: 13/11/2005

Neither team made any changes at half time. Thank goodness for Mildenhall. If only we’d had him last year, eh?

Grimsby Town 3 Macclesfield Town 1 11 Nov 2005, Coca Cola League 2 Within a couple of minutes of the restart the Big M had earned his and everyone else’s wages for the rest of the season. Parkin and Wijnhard played a quick one-two with Big Jon, about 20 yards out to the left of goal, swivelling and assassinating the ball towards the top left-hand corner. The Mildster stood tall and plucked the ball from underneath the crossbar. Absolutely brilliant, from both of them. Marvellous technique from the striker to turn and shoot so accurately, so powerfully, and such effortless calm and authority by our lordly keeper. A minute later Town won a corner, which was half cleared out of their penalty area on their left. Newey tried to retrieve possession with a hooking , sluicing, man-eating studs up tackle, dislodging several limbs from a defender. The referee allowed play to continue as Macclesfield broke away up their left. One of their little players, possibly Bullock, turned inside and out, beating McDermott for pace. Alone, racing away for the half way line, a goal seemed certain. The Mildster took a few steps forward, jumped up and puffed his chest out, his arms spread as wide as could be, and stared at the striker. Like a king cobra he mesmerised his prey, choosing his moment to leap forward and snaffle his supper, the ball ballooning off his chest and away for a corner. If they want to score against the Big M they’ll need to take a shehnai double-reed flute and large laundry basket with them. A single reed won’t do. Mildenhall’s great, isn’t he. Bolland decided to ruffle the Macc-lads’ hair a bit, having ten minutes of omnipresence sweeping away danger and shushing the ball to his partners in mime. The Town defence struggled en masse with Parkin, deploying two and three players to hoover around his feet, resulting in many moments of fear. Boy, were we impressed with Parkin; supposedly an unfit Parkin: now this is how a lump should play. Our lump? Not so bad today; holding the ball occasionally, turning and flicking too. Just don’t ask him to run much. Perhaps he was learning on the job from the lumpmeister general. Ooh, a corner; oh, Cohen headed over. Ooh again - something, almost, but not quite. Things are improving. What Town need is a thingamajig that would bring everyone together. A goal? On the hour Town got a free kick which was clumped up from the right by Newey. So far, so normal, the ball bibbled about and Reddy set off on one of his road trips across the USA, via the deadzone underneath the Stones/Smiths/Findus stand. After a couple of twirls, step-overs and a traditional Bulgarian folk dance, he turned infield and crossed in to the near post where Ramsden challenged Fettis, who punched the ball out. Toner controlled the ball in the middle of the Macclesfield half and tapped it aside to Newey. Young Tom dribbled past one defender and, about 25 yards right in the centre, leathered a low shot goalwards. The ball hovered an inch above the hallowed turf, a defender dummied, Fettis finally fell to his left and NEWEY had scored. Finally. The ball screamed into the bottom left-hand corner and Newey gesticulated to his personal moan club in the Findus/Stones/Smiths stand. Now that’s favouritism: what about the purple people and the dentists? When purple people are happy what colour are they? Mauve? Plum white in the Dulux paint catalogue?

Grimsby Steve Mildenhall John McDermott Justin Whittle Simon Ramsden Tom Newey Gary Cohen Paul Bolland Ciaran Toner Andy Parkinson Gary Jones Michael Reddy Subs Calvin Andrew 81 mins Gary Croft Martin Gritton Terry Barwick Glen Downey Attendance 3,658 Referee Eddie Ilderton (Tyne & Wear) 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 Andrew Bolland Cohen Gary Jones McDermott Mildenhall Newey Parkinson Ramsden Reddy Toner Whittle Nominations count towards the Player Of The Month shortlist.

Macclesfield continued to contain minor peril that may upset young children with Parkin and Wijnhard rocking and rolling around the Town defence. The ball dropped, Parkin bazookaed a first time shot a yard wide from 25 yards out. You didn’t see it? You must have blinked. Can we have him please Mr Fenty? A Macc corner crumbled through the area with no-one touching it. A free kick curled into Mildenhall’s waiting arms, which were attached to his waiting body. The pressure was tightening on Town: Macc fizzing, the pace upped, Parkin scary. Parkin turned Whittle into a novelty pin cushion, the sort you can buy in tea shops in the Wolds for £1.50, but fell over as he was free inside the area.

The snow flurry over, Town returned to the Pontoon with some one-touch passing mixed in with some lobs into the corner for Reddy to chase. He is Michael Reddy and that is what he does. Swooshing past Morley on the right, Reddy rolled into the area, along the bye line, and crossed into the near post, near Jones, who nearly touched it. We were nearly happy. Repeat formula, substitute Parkinson for Jones, add some egg white, beat with a whisk and watch Parky swing the ball over the bar from the edge of the six yard box. Worth an "ooh" in anyone’s language; except Welsh.

You blinked again didn’t you. Gary Jones daintily turned, surged forward and almost played a perfect pass through the centre of the defence. Reddy almost through but wasn’t, sit down again. Get back up again - you may wish to catch the ball as it sails by. Parky perkying past three, curling the ball into the upper echelons of society, or the back of the Pontoon, whichever is poshest.

You do see some amazing things these days. Lumpy the bush kangaroo bounced through two challenges, leapt over the eucalyptus tree at left back and clipped a tantalising cross over Fettis and just over Cohen’s head. Whatever will they think of next?

Macclesfield brought on John Miles for his fifteen minutes of fame. With all their troubles I’m sure his music will pull them through. Or they could just make sure Parkin remains fit. Around this time the game slipped into a bit of a torpid patch, not helped by a tubby linesman and Reddy’s continuing quest to build a tunnel under the Humber. Are you worried at Wijnhard slipping into the Town area and lobbing the ball just past Mildenhall’s right hand post? You are? Then you weren’t very observant: the linesman’s flag had been up for ages. The Town defence continued its four man tug of war with the mighty Parkin, just about winning. Just.

With ten minutes left Town walloped the ball high down the pitch way into the Macclesfield area on their left. Jones challenged and a defender half-hooked the ball out of the area. Cohen, about 20 yards out near the corner of the box, chested the ball forward with the full-back careering off towards Spurn Point. These ships passed in the night, observing maritime law by switching their lights on and sounding their horns. Along came another defender, with Cohen stepping down on the bouncing ball, sending this one towards Chapman’s Pond with a warning about the bottomless pit that awaits him if he’s naughty. Fettis advanced to the edge of the six yards box and COHEN, as he stumbled, steered the ball, left-footed, towards the bottom right-hand corner, perfectly bisecting the plunging keeper and Whitaker’s dying swan on the goal-line. Think of John Barnes against a troupe of Brazilian circus clown’s. Honk! 3-1, game over, yes!

Andrew immediately replaced Parkinson and we were re-introduced to that old tactic of whacking the ball towards the big bloke on the wing, which rather took the gloss paint off the rather fine new fitted wardrobes. The last ten minutes had a couple more tug’o’war sessions with Big Jon and two lustrous Cohen dribbles that ended with nothing much, but they looked good for a few seconds.

Is that it? Well. O’Reddy has to riverdance once per game and he shivered down the right one more time for his old gran. Lung-bursting past two defenders, he shuffled into the area and, from a narrow angle, flickered the ball across the face of goal, missing post and Jones by an equidistance. The long day’s journey into night had ended. Smile! We won. Smile! We won eventually playing some fluid passing football. Isn’t that what we want?

It wasn’t an orgy of wonderfulness: Town were OK, doing what the sullen silent shrinking support want adequately, and winning. Let’s not get too carried away just because we didn’t lose. However it was totally clear that the players were thinking before they kicked it and were making an effort.

Base camp rebuilt: we can start climbing again.

Nicko’s Man of the Match

As usual Bolland ran around a lot, what some would call the heart of team. Toner had by far his best game for Town, playing simple passes quickly and standing in the right places. Town won because they didn’t concede more than they scored and for that they have one man-mountain to thank: Steve Mildenhall, for thwarting the evil schemes of the silkymen. His very existence is enough to cause a rip in the space/time continuum of your average fourth division striker, and even very good ones.

Official Warning

Mr E Ilderton. He wasn’t that bad, playing advantage intelligently and correctly. A few little mistakes, and could have given Town a penalty when Reddy fell over a body. From 100 yards away it was clear Reddy was already falling before the Maccman arrived, so let’s not be too one-eyed. It didn’t matter anyway, we won. Everybody be cool, this wasn’t a robbery, his wining lottery numbers are 6.81723

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