I love this story of Grimsby fans and their inflatables. It's the silly, happy side of football. Football is a nice distraction from everyday annoyances and stress, and these kind of stories are good distractions from the sometimes overly commercial world of Premier League or Champions League football.
Two years ago a Grimsby fan was arrested at an away match at Forest Green Rovers for refusing to hand over an inflatable beach ball that he took into the stadium. His fellow supporters were upset at his treatment by the stewards inside the stadium. In solidarity with him they decided to take as many inflatables to their next away match at Barnet. And at that match a fan was arrested and found guilty of assaulting a steward with an inflatable shark. He maintains the fans were jumping around, celebrating when he was taken out of the stands by the police.
This weekend Grimsby are playing away to Barnet and to mark the fixture fans were planning to take inflatables with them again, to carry on the tradition of the amount of fun they bring to away matches. But Barnet have let them know that inflatables are banned, wary of their being a repeat of what happened in 2015.
So what could they bring instead of the inflatables to create a fun atmosphere at an end of season League Two match with no significance for either mid-table team? They started a crowdfunding campaign to raise enough money to hire a Mariachi band. A Mariachi band at a fourth division football match in North London. Fantastic. As of this evening they were £257 over their £1000 target. I'll be looking forward to footage of that match.
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