Plucky minnows almost cause a shock

Congratulations are due to plucky minnows Weymouth. The Conference South outfit came within 45 minutes of recording a real upset at the Wessex Stadium last night when their first team went 2-0 up against Yeovil Town u-18's by half-time. Unfortunately the brave part-timers couldn't sustain their challenge against the football league side's youngsters, gradually allowing the Glovers back into the match. Doubtless the fact that the Yeovil side contained nine 16-year-olds unfairly meant that they could run around faster than their grown men counterparts on the Weymouth team and the Yeovil goals were lucky too, probably. The final score was 2-2, but the 350-strong, er, crowd went home happy secure in the knowledge that if the Terras can push a centre of excellence football league side so close to a defeat then a mid-table spot in the Conference South is there for the taking. Possibly.

Fair play, it's easy to laugh at them now, and young Yeovil supporters (anyone aged under 30, basically) won't remember this, but at one time Weymouth used to be quite good. When I say quite good I mean they were roughly on a par with the mighty Glovers. We used to be in the same league for a lot of the time and the rivalry between the sides and both sets of supporters was pretty intense. It may seem hard to believe now but some derbies in the '50's attracted crowds of over 10,000 to Huish, and even in the '60's and '70's an attendance of 6,000+ was nothing unusual whenever the Terras came to town. Have a look at HHH's potted history of the rivalry between the club's for a flavour of the history involved.

Things are different nowadays. We're still getting crowds of 6,000+, but that's against the likes of Leeds United, not the Muff, or the seaside scummers as we jocularly called them. We are football league, they are conference south and the only time we ever play them - unlikely FA Cup ties apart - are in pre-season friendlies. It's sad to say it, but they're not our rivals anymore. They're a joke club now, fit only to be laughed at.

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More on the Lee Peltier transfer: A very, very good source close to the board has come up with the info that the up-front figure the club received from Huddersfield for Peltier was (drum-roll) £150,000. For what it's worth I'm more inclined to believe this figure than the previously reported £250,000 which a certain friend of the chairman was pushing on the green room recently as being the real fee. The daft thing is that £150,000 up front without having to wait for any installments isn't an unreasonable deal for a player out-of-contract in 12 months time who was (apparently) attracting no interest this time around from any other club, so again, why not tell us that? Give the supporters the facts, what am I saying? What a radical idea, it'll never catch on.

Just read: Gridlinked by Neal Asher. Superior space-opera, nothing more, nothing less. I know a lot of people turn up their noses at any kind of science-fiction but that's their loss. Sheer escapism of course, but nothing wrong with that now and then. Recommended.