This week, on the 'View From The Findus' podcast, we have started to build our ultimate 21st century 'Grimsby Town eleven'.

To start, we have scrutinised ‘the good, the bad and the ugly’ of the men with the gloves!

Eventually, we narrowed it down to three fabulous 'number ones': Mildenhall (great keeper in a nearly outstanding season); McKeown (most appearances in the last 23 years and a big part of our promotion in 2016); and Coyne (do I even need to add anything?).

Honourable mentions went to Crocombe, Henderson (Dean) and of course Mr Forecast!

Feel free to add your vote at this link:

I am less confident on that one.

UTM

Can't look past Coyne for me.

I'd have Wayne Henderson in there above Dean Henderson as honorable mentions. Dean might have gone on to be better but the impact Wayne had in helping us avoid relegation that season was much greater.

Nobody comes close to Coyne do they total class.

I'll always be fond of Steve Sherwood for his time between the sticks in Sir Alan's first couple of years in charge. 183 appearances, 2 promotions and a couple of cup runs speaks for itself.

Quoted from Manchester Mariner

I'll always be fond of Steve Sherwood for his time between the sticks in Sir Alan's first couple of years in charge. 183 appearances, 2 promotions and a couple of cup runs speaks for itself.

Not 21st century though.

Coyne for me, with Mildenhall mentioned in dispatches.

Quoted from ginnywings

Not 21st century though.

Coyne for me, with Mildenhall mentioned in dispatches.

Missed that part. Schoolboy error.

Also not 21st century but Batch was a hell of a keeper.

Coyne was incredible, he even got his initial wobbly spell out the way in the 20th century spell for us.

QPR away, smash and grab 1-0 win. Don't think I've ever seen a 'keeper busier or more unbeatable.

But in a weird way, Mildenhall was more enjoyable to watch as he just commanded everything so well. Coyne was a top drawer shot stopper but he was suspect on crosses, Mildenhall just more of an all rounder.

For the respective levels, Mildenhall probably had better defences in front of him. Coyne was the back end of our time punching above our weight with the Handyside and Lever dominated spells replaced by the Chettle's and Raven's of the era.

Anthony Williams, no?

Mildenhall for me, but only because I don't really have memories of Coyne (his last season was my first and I only probably went to 3 or 4 games that year).

Easily Coyne . One of the reasons we had long spells in the championship. A few vital saves earn enough points to save relegation.

His performance at QPR as previously mentioned when we probably should’ve lost 6-1 instead of winning 1-0 thanks to at least 6 world class saves is one I’ll be proud of saying I was there that day

Quoted from promotion plaice

Also not 21st century but Batch was a hell of a keeper.

Yes my schoolboy / early teens goalkeeper hero
UTM.

Quoted from louth_in_the_south

Easily Coyne . One of the reasons we had long spells in the championship. A few vital saves earn enough points to save relegation.

His performance at QPR as previously mentioned when we probably should’ve lost 6-1 instead of winning 1-0 thanks to at least 6 world class saves is one I’ll be proud of saying I was there that day

Legendary goalkeeping performance. The one at Preston was special too.

Danny Coyne was outstanding, I think the only poor season he bad was the relegation season (his final season) but then in fairness that was a very tough season for us all so we can't blame him for that

1. Danny Coyne
2 Aidan Davidson
3 Steve Sherwood
4 Nigel Batch
5 Dave Beasant ( best loan keeper ever)

Can't argue with Coyne
Thought Davidson was top drawer as well

Davison, not Davidson.

He was a fine keeper. One of those, like Mildenhall, who never seemed to be too busy because they were so competent in all areas of the game. Coyne was a remarkable shot-stopper but it was a case that he was welded to the line when crosses/set pieces came into the box. Some of his saves came about when an effort came in where a different keeper would have snuffed out the chance by coming to collect or punch a cross. He wasn't the biggest of keepers so wasn't as comfortable with crosses as the likes of Davison, Mildenhall, Crocombe, etc.

Quoted from thefish

This week, on the 'View From The Findus' podcast, we have started to build our ultimate 21st century 'Grimsby Town eleven'.

To start, we have scrutinised ‘the good, the bad and the ugly’ of the men with the gloves!

Eventually, we narrowed it down to three fabulous 'number ones': Mildenhall (great keeper in a nearly outstanding season); McKeown (most appearances in the last 23 years and a big part of our promotion in 2016); and Coyne (do I even need to add anything?).

Honourable mentions went to Crocombe, Henderson (Dean) and of course Mr Forecast!

Feel free to add your vote at this link:

Tweet 1707997900955853299 will appear here...

I am less confident on that one.

UTM

I know he's not in the time frame but Sir NIGEL BATCH for me

Davison in his first spell is the best non-loan 'keeper I've seen in a Town shirt.

In sticking with the 21st century thread opener, his second spell (in that period) was woeful though and to some extent blotted his copy book a little.

Dipping back into the 90's, completely agree with Dave Gilbert's Left Peg regards Dave Beasant.  30 years on and I'm still convinced that had, by some miracle, we managed to hold onto him for the season we would have spent the next season as a Premier League side.

That month spell was peak-Buckley.  We had maintained the clever and neat football that got us back-to-back promotions but we had also added/developed genuine quality players with the likes of Groves, Mendonca, Handyside, Croft et al.  Beasant in goal took us to that next level.  

Quoted from Davec

Danny Coyne was outstanding, I think the only poor season he bad was the relegation season (his final season) but then in fairness that was a very tough season for us all so we can't blame him for that

The defence was a mess that season in general, started out with the terrible Paul Raven, who was replaced by the very much past it Steve Chettle, who got injured and then our central defence consisted of two midfielders turned into defenders in Santos and a very much past his prime Groves partnering Ford who was a bright spark. John McDermott was solid and Gallimore was very much beloved but balls deep into probably alcoholism at that point so his performances suffered. It's a season full of chopping and changing, bringing in mercenaries on loans/short term deals and a lack of consistency which is always a recipe for a bad season. We had our best spell incidentally when Kabba came in on loan and looked a world beater but he had no interest in spending the whole season with us and it went downhill from there. A rotating door of players plus the fact Groves reportedly didn't have the respect of the dressing room meaning he couldn't turn it around put the final nail in the coffin on his GTFC career.

The following season had much of the same problems, the fact we lost Coyne for free like many of our saleable assets always made me mad. I don't even recall him being out of contract, I think he was allowed to go for free because we couldn't or refused to pay him what we had been.

John Oster that season too, Kris, as a bright spot.  Crying shame that we only got a single game of him and Kabba together.  

That season was such an odd one.  We were poor when it came to quality but for all the chopping and changing there did seem to be a real battling spirit.

On paper, across the whole of the season, I think there was enough quality to have stayed up. But the quality was spread out over the course of the season and our budget definitely reflected the injuries or stage of their career that those quality players had.   Coyne, McDermott, Barnard, Santos, Oster, Cooke, Kabba, Boulding, Pouton, Coldicott, Campbell even Michael Keane and Richard Hughes were decent players for that level.  Robert Taylor too, who was quality, but just couldn't get and stay fit.  Jevons was farmed out early on in the season to save money/punish him.  There's the vast bulk of a very decent Championship XI there.

Was a real shame to see how that Groves team from the back end of 01/02 wasn't kept together.  I know realistically we would never have kept Andy Todd but for the likes of Boulding, Allen, Butterfield to go and not be replaced was a big blow.

Richard Hughes was an odd one as I remember him looking OK for us, but nothing more, so I was amazed when he went on to play regularly in Portsmouth's Premier League side at the time.

Yeah same, I thought he was just ok.  A Steady Eddie type, but clearly had something more about him to go onto a very decent career with Portsmouth.  I think the bulk of his spell here might have coincided a bit with when the bottom fell out a for us.  Once John Oster's second loan spell ended, we only picked up 2 points from our final 9 games.  Hughes scoring only one of the four goals in that spell as well.

Put it this way, he was better than Chris Bolder.

Whereas Michael Keane seemed to be a complete psycho who was likely to get sent off at any minute, possibly headbutting the referee before heading down the tunnel.

I always have massive regret about the way Groves left the club, but I suppose his subsequent record proved that he wasn't really up to the task as a manager. Such a fantastic player for us, however.

By all accounts an excellent coach though.

His record isn't great, no two ways of looking at it.  Even with the Great Escape here we were quite poor at first under him and then the following 20 months after it wasn't great.  02/03 as a season was a bit of a free hit really.  We didn't have a pot to urine in and were always heading down.

Season after we should have done better.  He seemed to put together a decent squad that just never clicked.  I always felt he became a bit obsessed with needing to sign a 'big man' and just brought in a wave of journeymen No 9's who were completely ineffective, it took until Graham Rodger took over and brought Lee Thorpe in who gave us what we had lacked.  Just a big, unselfish and powerful striker.  Not perfect but worked well with those around him.  

Still feel that dressing room let him down though.  They were the ones putting in the excrement and half-arsed displays.  But part of management is getting the best out of players.  

At Bournemouth his side that started the season only picks up 8 points from the first 11 games before he's sacked, they then go onto drop just 24 points for the rest of the season under Eddie Howe (missing out on the League One title by a single point).  Howe did bring back Brett Pittman who wasn't far off a goal a game but the core of the squad was one Howe inherited, again though you've got to get the best out of players.

Ultimately I don't he wasn't right for management.  But his credit as a player more than bails his reputation out and I think most accept that the task at hand was nearly impossible.  The circling of the drain had started.