Stu Cox's Barmy Army !!! GTFC

July 2004 and with the sacking of Nicky Law fresh in the minds of grimsby fans the board decided to turn to a youthful manager and it ended up been no other then the local lad Stu Cox who playing carrear doesnt say much as it was ended last season due to a knee injury. Cox who played for Blackpool,Dagenham,Grimsby(on loan) and Tranmere before the injury found himself in a managers job and it was pleasing he said that it was his own team various signings occured during the season in that Arthur Numan, Franciso Flavanan,Roger Pettersen, and some other free agents with the loan signings of Rob Walker (Oldham) Terry Barwick (S****horpe) Kelvin Lomax (Oldham) Conrad Logan (Leicester) and a few more ill tell u about l8r

P.N i am already half way through the season {Jan 2005} so i will just give u a little round up

i won my first 3 games then it went slightly pear shaped and i didnt win for around 6 or 7 then i beat Chester 2 - 0 and that started a great revival i think if i remember i have lost 2 in about 10 and im 9th in league

The LEague cup went out in the first round 3-2 to West Ham a
Bobby Zamora scored a pen after 7 mins and Darren Mansaram equalised after 24/25 mins Micheal Reddy gave grimsby the lead after 66 mins but marlon harewood equalised in the 90th minute and in extra time won the game for the hammers after 99 mins

Grimsby have got Blackpool in the LDV VANS TROPHY semi final so not doing too bad in that

Please keep reading (MORE L8R)

LDV VANS SEMI FINAL GRIMSBY 1 - 4 BLACKPOOL

Joe Lightowler actuallly put us in front but with Richardson debutising with a young Midfielder Robert Burns (carnt remember)

But anyway the season has now ended and i got grimsby into the playoffs with something like 2 defeats in 20 games but one of the was against the eventually runners up 4 - 0 i finished 5 though i could of got automatic promotion if it wasnt for an 86th minute winner from Daniel Chillingworth for Cambridge which gave them 6th place and a place in the playoff.

Stu Cox learned the fate that 3 defender and 1 striker were retiring.Whittle,Mcdermott (whos been at grimsby 17 years about) and Van Wonderen with my veteran norweigan striker Ola Lygnvaer.

The playoffs consisted of Oxford,Grimsby,Cambridge and Bristol Rovers and I got drew against Oxford in the Playoff semi finals with the first leg at blundell park i was hoping for a good scoreline with the lineup of Logan,Forbes,Chamberlain,Ramsden,Mcdermott,Pinault,Dyer,Parkinson,Reddy,Echanomi

it won 2-0 and with the same team drew 2-2 so tht was it we were going to Cardiff and playing Bristol Rovers i knew it was going to be tough With Logan with Ireland under 19s Richardson was called upon i was starting to regret to let Logan go but i didnt want to down Richos morale so yeh ill stick by him,Atkins sed Bristol were high on confidence and i laughed and sed so r we ..... we were 15th before christmas so we did exceptinally well....

As the game got going it was us and we steamed into 3-0 lead at half time could we keep it up ........ NO 3-3 time for Pinault and Echanomi ooo god 4-3 bristol 10 mins to go .... but thank god we got a penalty 4-4 Pinault scored 5 mins to go ..... we attacked there goal and alot of "Hits the side netting" came up ... final whistle extra time after 107 mins i unleashed Dean Gordon onto the pitch for Mcdermott who got a nice reception as that was his last match in pro football.... well any way bristol rovers ataccked and luckily for us are rare attack led to free kick 115 minutes gone .. Dean Gordon O YESSSS to delight of the mariners faithful it swung in 5-4 grimsby and shortly after the final whistle blew we won were up out of the basement league and we left the ground singing Grimsby up Scunny Down as they finished in "Wooden spoon" position...

PRE SEASON 05/06

alot of youngsters were released who were on me shortlist including Danny North the guy who i sold to chelsea for 75k PAul Lancasterfrom liverpool Gary Cahill from villa and a host more good squad assembled 1 friendly v Barkin and East Ham and we won 3-0 .......

Beginning of the season v swindon

are team mainly full of Debutants (i will give teamsheets from tomorrow) but it was virtually a different team and Kelvin Lomax came back on loan the youngster who delighted The Fans in his 4 games in our "Promotion" season as are Fans said and we drew 1-1 with swindon i can only remember Lomax played and scored in the 90th minute ... Grimsby are 40-1 to win league 1 so no hope there then but were 13th ok only after one game and with a point so its a start and if my mind servers me properly we have League 2 Winners last season Rushden in are second game with the other two auto position fillers (Swansea and Boston) im hoping for a mid table position this season and the board say itcould be struggle but try and avoid relegation but still we can all hope for Promotion to championship !!

More Soon Bye

Stu Cox
Grimsby Town Manager (on fm 2005 anyway)

Resigned as manager of Grimsby Port Vale beating us 7-1 was the last straw im now manager of conference north's newly promoted team Gateshead.