No plaice at St Mary’s for Harry Haddock after Grimsby FA Cup Tie ban
Tuesday, February 14, 2023 10:47 AM
Southampton Football Club have shown a distinct lack of humor in refusing to allow Harry Haddock into St Mary’s Stadium for the upcoming FA Cup tie against Grimsby Town.
There’s no plaice for Grimsby Town fan favorite Harry Haddock as the Mariners travel south to take on the Saints in the FA Cup fifth round.
However, Harry is not a person but the iconic inflatable fish mascot that Grimsby fans like to display at the big games.
Older fans will remember the craze for bringing inflatables to football matches in the late 1980s, Manchester City are credited with starting the craze in 1987 with an inflatable banana and it all exploded from there (pun intended). )
Soon fans across the country were bringing their own versions to the games and that included Grimsby Town taking on inflatable fish and soon Harry Haddock was born.
Grimsby have always been known for their fishing fleet, so it was only natural that they would adopt a fish as an inflatable and proudly display it even as the team on the field was taking a beating.
The chipped goals were celebrated with hundreds of Harry Haddocks waved by Grimsby fans as their opponents got a bird’s eye view of the proceedings.
Unfortunately the fishermen friends along the M27 did not stick to the program and did not attend the games with inflatable skates.
But some 35 years later it seems the football is gone, Southampton FC have turned down an official request for Grimsby fans to bring Harry Haddock in droves, with nearly 5,000 of their fans likely to attend. It seems the Saints didn’t. I want 5,000 Harry Haddocks at St Mary’s.
Grimsby Town confirmed this to their own fans saying Southampton had turned down their request and informed them that they (SFC) had turned down similar requests from other clubs and any inflatables found would be confiscated.
Grimsby Town said this:
“The club received confirmation from Southampton today that Harry Haddocks will not be able to be at St Mary’s for our Emirates FA Cup fifth round tie.
“We share our supporters’ inevitable frustration at this decision, but we know they will support us brilliantly in our first FA Cup fifth round tie since 1996.”
This all sounds a bit strange and some reading this may feel this is a hoax, but apparently it is not, and on social media Grimsby fans have been venting their frustrations with phrases like “sad” and “boring”, while one warned that it would only encourage supporters. to “organize something that gives you a bigger headache.”
This isn’t the first time Harry has been banned – he was banned from Barnet in 2017 – but this is perhaps the most high profile.
Personally I can’t see the harm in it, Premium League football lacks any real fun at Premier League level, overall the support is bland and follows the same old pattern and songs so even though I don’t I was a big fan of the inflatable craze back in the day, times have changed so what’s the harm?
I certainly can’t see much from a safety standpoint, they are lightweight, bouncy pieces of plastic, they can’t be thrown very far and even if they could, they’d barely be felt if they hit you.
The Saints will claim they could flood the court, but that never happened in the ’80s and ’90s, so I can’t see why it will happen now.
In general, Southampton FC have shown a lack of humour.
Photo: Action Images
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| dirk_doone added 11:11 – Feb 14 Fisherman’s Friends is at the Mayflower Tbeatre, so there may be a plaice for them there. |  |
| kingsland34 added 11:16 – Feb 14 We just got rid of Taffy’s inflated ego. |  |
| wessexman added 12:02 – Feb 14 “Sing when you’re fishing, only sing when you’re fishing.” Bad show from the bosses of Santos. That being said, there’s plenty of hot air in the Saints’ boardroom. | |
| SanPabloVW added 12:07 – Feb 14 Just imagine 5000 Haddock’s and a world class light show. People pay a lot of money to go to Disneyland for that. | |
| If only added 12:17 – Feb 14 Ban haddock? You have cod to be kidding. | |
| boris1977 added 12:50 – Feb 14 Maybe Sports Direct is lining him up as Jones’ replacement. Think outside the box, etc. | |
| half timeorange added 13:48 – Feb 14 As if things weren’t exaggerated enough, I might bring my kazoo to promote the buzz of excitement. Has anyone on the board ever been to Grimsby? Your fans need something to cheer you up! | |
| DellBoyWally added 16:02 – Feb 14 Well, I just hope they don’t hit us! | |
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