The Story of my Season (2025/26)

What would I want to do were I not a town planner? Every now and then I like to imagine myself as the chief football writer at a broadsheet newspaper and to indulge that fantasy a little I have got into the habit of writing a match report on Instagram after every game that I have been to. This is a collation of reports that tell the story of a very special 2025/26 season.

Lincoln City 2 Reading 0

2 August 2025

So. Here we are. Another year around the footballing sun. Older? Definitely. Wiser? Possibly. Still though with the same joyful enthusiasm for the first day of the football season that I hope never diminishes. The day I take no pleasure on such occasions from turning to my match day companions (today both Stafford Boys) and commenting on how good the pitch looks is a day that is not worth looking forward to.

The youthful romanticist embraces today as pregnant with possibility. The seasoned pragmatist perhaps less so. Yes, of course, anybody can go up, but let us also remember the time when going down from the Conference looked more likely than climbing out of it and when dreams were of routine wins in the third tier.

I say routine, but, to be fair, our ‘keeper did tip two long range shots on to a post today. For the most part though we were the better side and, most-pleasingly, the players carried themselves with an air suggestive of knowing that they were indeed the better side. We got the goals at just the right times, which I never feel is a fluke. It is game management that, for me Clive, separates the men from the boys.

We have lost three, soon to be four, of last season’s eleven and only brought in two so there should still be some business to be done, but this remains a tidy side playing tidy football under the watchful eye of a tidy coach in, after some summer sprucing up, a very tidy ground.

As to whether I will be able to say the same this time next year, or indeed the year after that, is for the cosmos to decide, but I will be in The Golden Eagle an hour before kick off regardless.

C.D. Nerja 6 C.D. Valle de Lecrin 2

8 August 2025

Given that we have been coming out here for a little while it was perhaps a little anomalous that the local ground had not been ticked off already.

This first pre-season game of Nerja’s campaign in what we think is the Spanish fifth tier did not attract a bumper crowd. In fact I would go as far as to say that if what we assumed to be the player’s families were discounted there were only a handful of people present. Some local non-league die hards and a couple of eccentric tourists.

The football was not up to much, but the home team were neat and tidy and scored a couple of very good goals late on as their opponents gave up the ghost. We ventured that the visitors are some way below the fifth tier. That they turned up in three variations of their kit was the primary evidence for that assertion.

As well as the die-hards, another pleasing mirror of non-league adventures back home was the lad who thinks he is far too good for this level, but manifestly is not. The visitor’s no. 69, itself something of a clue as to his persona, was, if not box office, at least worth watching for his tireless shithousing.

The ground is as neat and tidy as Nerja’s football (and kit). Hidden unpretentiously just behind the main route through town, and entered by way of a lovely archway of an elegant art deco-style, it has covered seating down one side and on open terrace behind one goal. The other two sides abut apartment buildings such that Eldest observed that it evokes the kind of South American pitch option that you might see when playing Volta on FIFA.

There is little more to say other than we now know exactly where the ground is, that it is only a short walk away and that the two of us are just that little bit more connected to the town. An anomaly put right, and $6 and two hours well spent.

Granada 0 Al Ain 3

10 August 2025

The drive from Nerja to Granada is a spectacular one. We three groundhoppers did the stretch to Motril on the way to watch Almeria a couple of years ago and it is tunnel after viaduct after tunnel after viaduct. The justification for a feat of engineering on this scale prompted an interesting conversation about infrastructure investment, economic development and the politics of the European Union…

The stretch from Motril up to Granada we all did when visiting the Alhambra last year. It is a similar feat, climbing high in no time at all into the Sierra Nevada. It prompted a further conversation about how to decide the best location for wind turbines…

Having got there, yes, the segments of scaffolding and temporary seating in the corners have undermined the cleanness of the concrete lines that the architect no doubt hoped would hold the four sides together, but when you are sat up at the top with the mountains in the background, a gentle breeze taking the edge off of the still stifling heat, and the gorgeous, soft, late-evening light very slowly fading, that becomes less of a concern.

The football? Well, having bent a golden rule about watching friendlies one is hesitant to be too judgemental. The ‘Nasrids’ (harking back to dynastic rulers of yore) might not be too optimistic about the upcoming campaign though. As the i’s are dotted and t’s crossed on this despatch late night is turning into the early hours and they might not have scored had they still been playing now.

Al Ain are the first team from Abu Dhabi that I have seen play and, under a Serbian who I read just now took charge of Watford for a short spell a few years ago, were as presentable in possession as World Club Championship participants should be. They were also very clinical when opportunities presented themselves and should have put at least a couple more past Luca Zidane.

My hope is to have conveyed a sense of just how lovely ticking this ground off with my boys was this evening (now yesterday…). ‘Life Is Sweet’ by The Chemical Brothers shuffled on just as we got back. I think I will give it another whirl now whilst I finish this splash of Spanish supermarket whisky…

Málaga 1 Eibar 1

17 August 2025

As noted in a recent despatch, there is little to compare with the joyful optimism that accompanies the first day of the football season and that sense was palpable as we joined the throng and made our way in this evening. Whilst the season, the kit and the hopes were new, the same old friends could be seen greeting each other in their same old seats.

The first half merits merely the most cursory of mentions, but the second half was lively. Eibar scored first by way of a great cross and a great late-run at the back stick. Not long afterwards though a misplaced pass allowed a Málaga forward to smash home an equaliser. That solicited the kind of roar that you hope for at a Spanish ground, but was still not as loud as the songs they sung about the eccentric referee as he started to lose control towards the end.

The mood amongst the Malaguistas as we filed out was then less joyful optimism and more world-weary cynicism. Less ‘here we go, here we go…’ and more ‘here we go again…’. 16th last season having immediately bounced back from the relegation we saw confirmed on our last visit three years ago, they drew seven at home and scored barely a goal a game here last term.

Were one to hazard a guess, Málaga have shaken up their squad in an attempt to do better this time around because, whilst bright in spells at some times, they appeared to be on different wavelengths at others. Were one to hazard a further guess, Eibar have kept most of the squad that recently got relegated together because they were much the more coherent.

The familiar then mixed with intoxicatingly exotic. Such is the joy of foreign ground-hopping. Different country. Different sights and sounds. Very much the same game.

Cádiz 1 Mirandés 0

17 August 2025

When the four of us arrived in Cádiz’s Old Town this afternoon it was quiet to say the least, though we did find somewhere to eat before three of us headed off to catch a bus back down to the New Town for the match.

When two of us got back from a drink just now, a little after midnight, Cádiz’s Old Town was the epitome of what we imagine continental culture to be. Families sat next to fountains enjoying ice cream. Ol’ boys and ol’ girls sat outside restaurants enjoying coffee.

Yes, yes, it is the climate, but that does not do enough to explain away the simple fact that here are people that actually want to live side by side with each other in an urban environment…

Anyway…, on the football front, one of tonight’s visitors was given his marching orders after just 23 seconds, which raised hopes of an incident-packed jamboree of excitement, but, no, alas, it was not. The hosts got their goal after 20 minutes, exploiting the free man with width and a series of crosses, one of which was finally converted.

That they did not secure a second goal and put the contest completely to bed raised further hopes at halftime that interest would be sustained by the visitors burgling something late doors, but no, alas, they did not. The away fans above us did get excited by a goal that the referee initially appeared to give, but then disallowed for a foul on the ‘keeper. They, and we, had nothing to get excited about after that.

What then, in the final analysis, is to be learnt from this escapade? Well two things come to mind.

Firstly, driving four hours to tick off a ground (admittedly it should not have taken that long, my mistake, but we did unexpectedly get to see Africa as well as the Rock of Gibraltar yesterday afternoon) is also to visit places that one might not do otherwise. We have this morning to explore Cádiz further.

Secondly, booking Partridge-style Travel Taverns for work through a platinum hotels.com account does accrue points sufficient to book nights in places that provide complimentary Brut Cava, which can be enjoyed whilst trying to describe a day that was very much worth recording for posterity.

Bolton Wanderers 1 Lincoln City 1

23 August 2025

Since the Imps’ previous visits here have resulted in 3-1, 2-0, 3-0 and 3-0 defeats ranging between the tepid and the abject, three of which your correspondent witnessed first-hand, today during pre-season fixture planning was very much one for the kitchen calendar simply because it is only 40 minutes from home. This though, it is already apparent only a few games in, is a different side to those that the Trotters have hosted of late. To poise and panache have been added power and personality.

I buy programmes nowadays solely as souvenirs from new grounds, but I did buy one today because after Tuesday’s nuggety win at Northampton (one of three wins in four) I did sense (Youngest will attest) that this would be a game worth remembering. When Lincoln scored after 18 seconds it felt like £3.50 well spent.

When you watch a game from behind the goal you always see a game of two halves. With us attacking the far end we witnessed a tactical masterclass. One great save apart, they were at arm’s length throughout. There was always a man over in defence. There were always options in possession. Time passed quickly.

After the break, well, it is hard to say, because the game was largely played somewhere between 99 and 130 yards away. A battering is too strong a term, but we were very much under the cosh. Time passed slowly.

On the hour, having withstood the inevitable post-rollicking onslaught, they hit the bar and then moments later had a goal disallowed for offside. That, God of Football, surely means that it is our day?

Alas not. Seven minutes into seven minutes of added time, whilst trying to win another corner to take short, our striker booted the ball into a defender, but, rather going behind, it deflected to their ‘keeper who launched an attack that ultimately ended with their winger finally getting the better of our left wing-back and sending a ball across the box that was evidently turned in at the back stick by our right wing-back.

Did they deserve a point? Go on then. Possibly. Would we have taken one? Probably. Did it feel like a defeat? Absolutely. Football. Bloody hell.

Dog Daisy FC 5 PSV Braunschweig 3

30 August 2025

Between the early 1990s when your correspondent started following the Mighty Imps and when Rotherham Utd fell out with scrap metal mogul Ken Booth and moved out of here in 2008, unlike every other away trip within a two hour radius, I never actually paid Millmoor a visit.

Imagine then my excitement when I spotted on Instagram yesterday afternoon that not only is the ground still standing (I have long assumed otherwise, even when Youngest and I watched Lincoln win at the nearby New York Stadium not long ago), but that tonight it was playing host to game between, what I subsequently learnt from a programme lovingly prepared by the visitors, a team from Germany’s lowest league and a pub team from Mexborough.

Braunschweig, I also read, is not only the home of football in Germany (British rules were first translated there apparently), but also home to a team that like to play in ‘ghost grounds’. This foray, taking in Rotherham tonight and Keighley on Sunday, is their first abroad.

What a way to take in a new, old, ghost ground. Rotherham played here for over a century, but have not played here for 20 years. The dust, the weeds, the menus for pies never to be bought again. “It’s like being in a time machine”, another chap keen for photos said.

On the pitch, well, that is to be glossed over.

Off of the pitch is where the interest lay. A social scientist would have been intrigued to be out in Rotherham with the players tonight. The visitors and their supporters arrived with rainbow flags, anti-war banners and a ‘St. Pauli’ kind of vibe. With all due respect to the friends and family of the hosts, drinking all of the pilsner before halftime and chanting ‘you fat bastard’ at the portliest of their guests did not betray the same kind of hipster sensibility. That is football though. The great leveller.

After the players, their friends and families, and the groundhoppers, there was a fourth category of attendee tonight as well. An O’d Boy followed us out and as we crossed the road, but carried on past into the gloom as we got in the car. ‘I bet he sat in the same seat tonight as he used to’, observed Youngest. Yes. I bet he did.

North Ferriby 1 Blyth Spartans 0

6 September 2025

Did you ever wonder during those interminable Brexit years when David Davis was introduced on the Today programme as the MP for Haltemprice and Howden where Haltemprice and Howden is? Well, North Ferriby is in the Haltemprice area of the East Riding. If you still cannot picture it, the ‘View from the Allotment End’* of Grange Lane takes in the Humber Bridge. That’s right. This introductory paragraph has been constructed just to be able to say that those travelling to watch this match almost went to Hull and back.

The star of North Ferriby Utd, though formed in 1934, burnt most brightly, and most briefly, in recent times. That club won the competition being competed for today, the FA Trophy, in 2015 and reached the National League for a single campaign in 2016/17 (meeting Lincoln under the first season of the halcyon Cowley era). Today’s iteration of ‘The Villagers’ is a phoenix of that club, which three relegations later were liquidated.

In so far as a match report is concerned, two events of note occurred within minutes of each other in the first half and your correspondent managed to miss them both. On or around the half hour mark it was decided that we should watch the game from the opposite corner flag and in making our way around the ground somebody needed a pint and we managed to miss a North Ferriby red card. Moments after leaving the bar a train went past on a line that immediately adjoins the ground, which meant that we only just saw the ball rippling the back of the Blyth net.

That should have set the game up for a rip-roaring second half, but it did not. The hosts played as if they had eleven men and the visitors played as if they were playing against eleven men. Nothing, truth be told, really happened.

That did not really matter though. One of us got to think about something other than a new school timetable for a couple of hours. One of us got to think about something other than the implications of the Government reshuffle for a couple of hours.

A decent pint for me, chips and trains for him, and another new ground for us both. Not quite Hull. A lot like heaven.

*The name of a very commendable club fanzine.

Manchester City 2 Napoli 0

19 September 2025

There was palpable excitement in the Stafford house on Tuesday when I told the boys that I had got tickets for tonight. There was palpable excitement walking from the car to the stadium (and not just because I managed to park for free…) because the Neapolitans are a great Continental glamour side and the return of Kevin De Bruyne added an additional layer of emotional interest.

Within 18 minutes though that excitement, for your neutral correspondent at least, had dissipated. It would have been hard to predict right up until a Napoli defender got his marching orders (bizarrely, given that everybody in the ground apart from the referee could see it was a foul, after the intervention of VAR) that it would have been a classic, that we would have seen the new, more expansive City; that we would have seen why the visitors arrived as Italian champions; that KDB would have scored a late winner. They were all at least possibilities though. Alas from that point they were not (De Bruyne was almost immediately hooked). The dye was cast. Conte’s bus was being firmly parked.

That City had a go at them before the break arguably worked in their favour. Yes, the ‘keeper was forced into making saves, but every save gave them succour, gave them belief. Every clearance or blocked shot gave them a reason to performatively gee up the away end (which, to be fair, did not need much geeing up).

No, save for the mad Monaco game a few years ago (I recall that Bernardo Silva starred that night before City bought him), this reverted to every other game I have seen at the Etihad. The drip, drip, drip, water-boarding of a packed defence as the ball gets moved from side to side, and then from side to side again, in full, smug, superior knowledge that at some point, inevitably, you know it and we know it, a crack will appear. That said, the two goals that City scored, when Foden (for a neat Haaland finish) and Doku did let loose their creative instincts, were very good goals.

Not then a Champions League classic, not even a good game, but the Stafford boys will remember it, and that is all that counts.

Gateshead 1 Halifax Town 2

21 September 2025

It rained all the way up, but there was no mention of a pitch inspection as we parked at the ground and took a tram into Newcastle for a brief wander around. The surface was though being inspected by the time we got back and, just as we were weighing up other local options, it passed, though likely only just.

It rained as the players warmed up and, looking out across the deserted athletics stadium, one could not help but wonder, will all due respect to the good people of Gateshead and their football club, whether this is what it is like as a journalist to watch England play a behind closed doors game at the far end of Eastern Europe.

It rained all the way through an eventful first half that was punctuated by three penalties, two scored, one, the first, missed by the visitors. Given the conditions, the quality of football was a credit to the players. Halifax looked in control, their new midfield maestro, Alice band and all, pulled all of the strings.

It rained all the way through a one-sided second half, the only threat to the Shaymen after finally getting a deserved lead being whether the referee would call proceedings to a halt. There was some splashing around before the break, but the longer the game went on the more it looked liked the clips that do the rounds online from time to time captioned by things like ‘they don’t play in conditions like this any more.’ Well they did, but when the ball starts stopping dead it is less of a contest of a more of a lucky dip. It must have been a close call, but, it should be pointed out, in difficult conditions the referee got most things right.

It rained as we got back to the car. I left on the whistle, keen to get some feeling back in my fingers. Eldest and his pal rocked up shortly afterwards having cheered their heroes from the field, smiles stretched across their faces.

It rained all the way back down.

It is still raining as I write this, having just watched Match of the Day. I managed to get through the whole day without knowing the final scores. Oh and Lincoln won again at lunchtime and were briefly at the top of the league.

I am not drinking Carlsberg, but if they did Saturdays…

Huddersfield Town 0 Manchester City 2

24 September 2025

There was only one logical response to a request from Eldest to pick him and his pal up after the game tonight and that was to get myself a ticket and take them. So I did. £20 to watch Phil Foden in one of my favourite grounds. Bargain.

Tonight’s tie was juxtaposed, for me at least, with that last night at Sincil Bank. Two League One sides at home. Two top flight titans away. Two very different spectacles. The Chelsea players will have alighted their bus, if not battered and bruised, then certainly fully appreciative of the test that they just about managed to overcome. The Manchester City players may have jumped straight on to their bus without showering because they barely had cause to break sweat.

At half-time it occurred to me that the only thing those in my immediate proximity had cause to clap during that first period was their substitutes warming up. They didn’t applaud Foden’s opening goal. I wanted to, but thought better of it.

On the hour mark I heard a fella a few rows behind me suggesting that “Town were still in it”. I can only assume that he was smoking crack somewhere before kick off. At no point during this whole affair were Town ever in it. If they even had a game plan I am not sure what it was. Again, the contrast with the Mighty Imps’ stirring efforts was stark.

When City finally scored their second after about 70 minutes or so I feel fairly sure that they had been in possession of the ball for about four minutes. That was how long both sides had substitutes on the sideline waiting to come on when there was a break in play.

A Huddersfield forward was unlucky to see a curling 25 yard effort cannon back off of the inside of the far post late on, but for my money that was the God of Football passing judgement on a performance from which nothing positive deserved to be taken.

£20 then to watch Phil Foden in a great ground and to be reminded that in the current Lincoln side I get to watch a dynamic, purposeful team with a clear vision and sense of purpose. They might be able to pay our out-of-contract starlets more money, but on this showing the Terriers very definitely cannot offer them that.

Boston United 0 Forest Green Rovers 0

2 October 2025

Having been in Wembley on Saturday, Liverpool on Sunday and Monday, and London yesterday, wait, no, and London on Tuesday, you could legitimately ask as I write this during the early hours of Thursday morning why I was in East Lincolnshire on Wednesday evening. The answer is a simple one. My Dad asked me to be.

Why so? Well, he took a shine to tonight’s visitors during the 2010s, Lincoln’s decade in the bottom tier, during which time we would bet on whether or not the Conference champions would finish above them; plus he also knows that I like to tick a new ground off; and perhaps as well he just wanted to watch a game of football with me.

That explains that, but why am I writing this now rather than crawling straight into the bed that I have missed so much this week? Well, a commitment to write a post-match report before bedtime is a commitment to write a post-match report before bedtime. That being said, whilst on the one hand this was a pretty turgid affair, on the other hand a contest almost entirely devoid of spectacle is a quick and easy one to write up.

Boston somehow stayed up last season and their fans evidently saw this a point well-gained. They forced the ‘keeper into three saves, all in the last five minutes, and so on that basis might consider themselves a little unlucky, but they will do well to score goals and stay up again on this showing. We shall see.

Forest Green Rovers arrived at the top of the league and (thanks to Halifax winning at Rochdale, which Eldest went to watch), departed at the top of the league, but they and Robbie Savage will no doubt see this as two points dropped. Whilst to say they bossed it, as Robbie Savage no doubt will, would be an over-statement, they did control the game for large periods and they did create the better chances. Chances that mostly did not force saves. To win any league though, and especially this league, requires a ruthlessness and a shared sense of joint endeavour that I just did not detect. We shall see.

Not then the greatest game of football, but it was a game of football that I got to watch with my Dad.

Halifax Town 1 York City 1

25 October 2025

As regular readers will know and football fans will appreciate, some games linger in the memory no longer than the walk back to the car. Some though warrant recollection because of either the spectacle or the sense of occasion. Today’s game had both.

Halifax started brightly, scored after 3 minutes and could have had another a short time afterwards. York, who scored two late goals to beat the Shaymen in last year’s play-offs (regular readers might also recall), soon though had a foothold, and shortly afterwards were dominant. They spurned numerous chances, but it was one passed up by the hosts just before the break that everybody in the crowd could see might later prove pivotal…

The second-half was as one-sided as it must be possible for a game of football to be. The hosts had, by my count, a sole foray into their visitor’s final third, from which they actually scored a goal rightly chalked off for offside. That aside, they were under the pump throughout. The records will show that Halifax had 5 shots in the game, 2 on target, and that York had 23 shots, 10 on target. To have been so close, only for their erstwhile reliable goalkeeper to spill a corner in the 88th minute, will feel like a defeat, but this really, really was a point gained.

Beyond the game was the occasion. Eldest turned 16 today and got to go to the game with his Dad, his brother, his two Grandads and his mates. He even got a mention at halftime.

He will hopefully remember it. I certainly will.

CD Estepona 1 Málaga CF 3

31 October 2025

Well would you believe it? Our half-term getaway just happened to coincide with the first round of the Copa del Rey…

Villarreal and Valencia were both not too far away (by which I mean within a couple of hours…), but so were Málaga, drawn away to a club that, as it happens, knocked them out last season.

There was a palpable sense of cup fever as we queued to get in (kids being allowed to stay up late, o’d boys drinking cans, ex-pats excited about getting to see both of their adopted clubs), but that quickly dissipated when an Estepona defender clattered into the back of a visiting forward and the subsequent penalty was confidently dispatched into the pleasingly old school-style stanchion in the top corner. The numbers on the back of the visitors’ shirts suggested that, whilst a few squad players were getting a run out, this was a banana skin that would not be slipped up on again.

The hosts’ early zest also dissipated soon after and the second half was a largely moribund affair until Málaga scored an excellent second goal with about 15 minutes to go, which, for all the world, Clive, should have ended the game as a contest. When though a young tyro of an Estepona substitute gathered a loose ball and lashed it into the bottom corner from the edge of box those thinking about an early dart thought better of it.

They did get to see another goal, but that was Málaga walking in a third with what become the final kick of the match.

So a fourth tier Spanish ground, a first, a Málaga away game, also a first, and another footballing adventure with my eldest boy. Not the last.

Sutton United 2 Halifax Town 0

16 November 2025

It just so happens that of all the activities that Eldest has been encouraged to try over the years he has alighted upon watching football matches as his favourite. So when he politely enquired a little while ago as to the possibility of taking him and his pals on a 500 mile round trip today I immediately said yes.

Does that make me a great dad? Well any parent would want to encourage their child’s hobbies, but it also just so happens that the Borough Sports Ground is in the Magic Book (Mike Bayly’s ‘British Football’s Greatest Grounds’) so that was not an entirely selfless decision…

100 Halifax fans, plus me, turned up this afternoon, but, unfortunately for them, their team did not. They were woeful. Whatever it was they were trying to do, and it was not easily apparent, was not working and by the time anybody thought to do anything about it they were two goals down. It could easily have been a couple more.

They did not deserve a lifeline, but were gifted one in the form of a penalty on the hour mark, which was duly squandered. Little much happened thereafter. Youngest went to knock about with the likely lads and your correspondent sauntered around trying to find an angle for an artistic photograph to accompany this match report whilst giving some thought as to what constitutes a great ground.

This place, also known as Gander Green Lane, has a down at heel charm about it. The remaining banks of curved corner terracing are remnants of another use and the 1950s grandstand is a remnant of another time.

Physically, it is quirky, though very much less cared for than other non-league grounds ticked off thus far. In making the case for inclusion in his book Mr Bayly draws more on the meta-physical. It’s uniqueness perhaps coming from the memories it evokes of Sutton’s past FA Cup heroics. Greatness then being the amalgamation of both the components of a place and the moments of significance that happen there. Who is to say, but it gave me something to think about driving home.

The Shaymen gave their supporters nothing to remember today, but it was a great day for somebody who enjoys taking his children to watch football matches.

Halifax Town 3 Solihull Moors 0

22 November 2025

Forgive me, Readers, you will have to excuse the fact that it was a couple of hours and a couple of glasses of wine ago and I cannot remember what was quoted about transcendental happiness at the start of Shane Meadows’ wonderful documentary about the resurrection of the Stone Roses (which Eldest and I have just watched again at his request), but that theme seemed an appropriate place to start.

Also sketchy are details of the most significant moment of today’s game because, unusually for your usually diligent correspondent, I missed it. With Youngest and his bag of sweets comfortable in his usual spot, and Eldest happy up with the Likely Lads, I excused myself momentarily to go and get some water (actually a very quick pint…) because, frankly, having been up since 5am (just in time for England’s middle order collapse) I was starting to flag a little.

The dismissal of a Solihull player for hauling down an attacker through on goal just before the break sounded uncontroversial, but it swung the game because whilst the hosts were one goal to the good at that point, courtesy of a goal bundled in from a corner, the visitors had played the brighter football and created the better chances.

When I saw the Shaymen last at Sutton they folded under minimal pressure. Here, against ten men, they were transformed in the second half into flat-track bullies. Their number 9 scored two good goals to complete a hat-trick and all thoughts of that recent capitulation were banished. Everybody left with more of a spring in their step than when they arrived.

The Stafford boys were back at home in time for Manchester City’s tea time kick off and now that the house is as quiet again as it was first thing this morning I can watch Match of the Day the way that nature intended, which is with a couple of cans of Life & Death and without knowing the 3pm scores.

Now that is transcendental happiness.

Matlock Town 3 Lincoln United 0

21 December 2025

As we drove back up the motorway, Youngest with his headphones on, me listening to a podcast about Lord Nelson, I considered a few avenues to explore when framing this match report.

The SatNav was eschewed on the way down so as to enjoy the Peak District in all of its splendour. From there could have been an exploration of the case for Derbyshire, nestled comfortably as it is between the public school sensibilities of the south and the gritty mill town teams of north, being the cradle of the game. Consider, for example, the Ashbourne Shrove Tuesday fixture.

I could also have explored why we were here today watching Lincoln United and not at the actual Home of Football watching Lincoln City, given that this was similar distance and so drive time away. It was, of course, to tick off another ground in The Magic Book*.

Relatedly, Eldest and his pals took themselves to Blackburn today to tick a ground off. That, the parenting angle, might have been worth exploring. Nature versus nurture. Monkey see, monkey do.

A minor factor in today’s decision was that it was free to get in, which could have led to an exploration of the extent to which football clubs give to rather than take from their fanbases.

Coincidentally on the Lincoln front, as City went 2-1 up against table-topping Cardiff City this afternoon Alan Power took a corner for United right in front of us. He, as Youngest now knows, was a link between the bad times and the good times at Sincil Bank, and I could perhaps have made a lot more of that.

Class-above though he was, when it comes to the actual game itself, Mr Power could do little about a less-experienced new teammate of his losing his rag and being cautioned for a second time just after the Gladiator’s opening goal. The visitors’ heads went down and hosts helped themselves to a couple more.

As it transpired as soon as we got home we went straight to a Christmas Party and happily stayed longer than planned, which means that, alas, given the commitment to writing a match report before bedtime, all of those avenues will have to remain largely unexplored.

*Mike Bayly’s ‘British Football’s Greatest Grounds’.

Lincoln City 2 Burton Albion 1

22 January 2026

‘What was the last game you got to’, asked an old pal in The Golden Eagle. Shamefully I had to scroll back through my timeline to be sure and, even more shamefully, it was Bolton (A) back at the start of the season.

Why tonight for just my second visit to the Home of Football of the campaign? Well I had manipulated my diary so as to have meetings in the East Midlands today and tomorrow in between a ‘Forest Legends’ thing in Newark tonight with my father, brother and brother-in law. That though had recently been rearranged because of a Forest game tonight, but, as chance would have it, a Lincoln game from the recent past had been rearranged for tonight. What are the odds…

I was thinking about Gary Player’s ‘the harder you work, the luckier you get’ philosophy during the first half because before kick off I got to say a very brief hello to my second ever boss, the principal of a planning and landscape practice near Sleaford. I will ask him another time if he foresaw that the young waffle merchant of then would turn into the middle-aged waffle merchant of now.

Sitting next to another pal’s eldest lad, I was reminded of the time that he and his dad and my eldest and I watched the Cowley’s second home game against Sutton in August 2016. As I pointed out and he graciously smiled and nodded in response to, he has only ever seen Lincoln City on an upward trajectory. Imagine that.

We were nowhere then. Perhaps worse than nowhere. We were floundering. Look at us now. Odds on in some quarters to be playing in the Championship next season.

The game? Oh yes. This is supposed to be a match report. A moment of magic got us ahead on the half hour mark or so after a scrappy start, but we conceded sloppily almost straight afterwards. The chatter after halftime during a little spell of Burton pressure was that the game might be in the balance. We went straight up the other end and scored.

I thought that we were ten pence short throughout, but we won. We are managing games in the way that good sides manage games. We are unbeaten in ten.

Halcyon days.

What’s the next game that I can get to…

Wigan Athletic 0 Lincoln City 1

31 January 2026

F. Scott Fitzgerald asserted that the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

The first half this afternoon was easy to interpret. Lincoln could have been a goal up after two minutes, were a goal up after twenty or so minutes, and dominated proceedings to the extent that the hosts were booed off at the break.

It was the second half that was indecipherable.

One could write that the passive visitors invited pressure, were wasteful in possession, had no outlet, no safety valve, and no threat. They made a series of muddled substitutions that not only failed to remedy these obvious deficiencies but arguably exacerbated them. They got, in other words, lucky.

One could also write that the visitors were calm and confident, inviting their opponents to dominate possession safe in the knowledge that any flickers of opportunity could be readily snuffed out. They made a series of canny substitutions that both recognised the host’s evolving threat and at the same managed the minutes of both key performers and new arrivals. They got, in other words, exactly what they deserved.

On the basis that even having reflected for a few hours since the final whistle your correspondent still has two opposing ideas in mind as to how Lincoln managed to come away with three points and yet still retains the ability to compile a match report surely means that his first-rate intelligence is beyond doubt.

But all of that’s what the point is not because, at the end of the day, absolutely not in doubt is that Lincoln again found a way, fast becoming the defining characteristic of this side, and that a twelfth consecutive game without defeat means that the gap between them and table-topping Cardiff is now down to two points. The Imps go marching on.

Bamber Bridge 2 Stockton Town 2

7 February 2026

Of the twenty non-league grounds within striking distance that were listed on the kitchen blackboard with the intention of visiting when the world opened up again post-Covid, three remain to be ticked off. Well two technically because it appears that Richmond have moved from a field beneath the castle to a leisure centre on the other side of the town. That leaves Hallam, away today, and Old Boltonians, postponed this morning (which the secretary kindly emailed to confirm).

What then were two groundhoppers to do? Youngest pointed out both that we need not limit ourselves to ‘Magic Book’ grounds* and, having scanned the fixtures, that Bamber Bridge were are home. So we went there.

The internet reveals that the village is perhaps best known for a racially-aggravated clash in 1943 between black American GIs and their white officers, with the locals rowing in behind the former when it kicked off in a pub one night. This rang a vague bell (mention on The Rest is History perhaps?) but Youngest knew all about it because it was a storyline used in ‘The Railway Children Returns’ apparently (Mr Bayly might not think this a great ground but there is a railway line directly behind the main stand so Youngest was in his element).

With a bit more drama one might have been able to reprise the ‘Battle of Bamber Bridge’ sobriquet, but there were no brawls, mass or otherwise, and nothing worthy of kicking off about. It was just the kind of competitive game of football that it was hoped two sides starting the day in 5th and 6th places would serve up.

A competitive game of two halves in fact, with the visitors deservedly two goals to the good at the break and the hosts deservedly sharing the spoils come the end.

A good, if not a great ground then, but a splendid afternoon out nonetheless. Now. Where else is there within striking distance…

*Mike Bayly’s Great British Football Grounds.

Lincoln City 1 Bolton Wanderers 1

15 February 2026

There is a school of thought prevalent amongst the hipster podcast community (such as that which accompanied the drive down today) that suggests individual games of football at the highest level exist now largely to provide content for the wider game of football. It is not, so it is argued, the 90 minutes itself that is important, but how many incidents it generates for the content machine and what the result contributes towards the narrative of a player, a team, or a manager’s season*.

The merits or otherwise of that argument aside, nestled just below the second tier, this was a Saturday afternoon of football at its most engaging and authentic. A compelling contest between two evenly matched sides at a pivotal point in their respective campaigns.

For a period early in the second half the atmosphere at a sold-out Sincil Bank was as febrile as this correspondent can recall because, most likely, of a recognition in all parts, with the game in the balance, as to what was at stake for both sides. If the away end could lift their charges the gap between 3rd and 2nd would be cut to only three points. If though the other three sides of the ground could lift their charges the gap between 2nd and 3rd would be extended to a potentially insurmountable nine points.

The fans spilling out of the away end come the final whistle were definitely the spritelier. Aside from a spell half way through the first half when they did not score, and the inevitable spell towards the end when they did, it was Lincoln that created by far the better chances. The Imps started well, ended well, and largely dominated a side significantly higher in the wage bill table in between.

A sense of frustration then, but, at the end of the day, this was a fourteenth game unbeaten and the six point gap is retained with one less game for Bolton to close it. It is to be hoped though that City’s profligacy today will not come back to haunt them when the story of the season is written.

*It could also be said that Hipster podcasters always have to come up with something clever to pontificate about…

York City 4 Halifax Town 1

21 February 2026

A promise is a promise and a promise had been made to Eldest that he and his pal would be taken today. Up until mid-morning your correspondent was not actually going to the game. The plan was to split up at the Park & Ride, the Likely Lads going to the footie and Youngest and I catching a bus to the Railway Museum. He though had a change of heart, which begat the short-lived question as to how I might kill a couple of hours on my Billy No Mates. Shopping? No. The Railway Museum? Er, no. I did, of course, buy a ticket in the genteel surroundings of a home stand.

This was one of those games that only one side consider a derby. The Minstermen looking haughtily down from both some distance away in the North Riding and, of late, an established position much closer to the top of the National League.

It would not have been the done thing for the Halifax manager to have walked into the post-match press conference and blamed the defeat on a poorly child, and certainly the club’s media manager would have had to cancel their plans for the evening had he done so, but he would have had a point.

The Shaymen were, if not excellent for the first nine minutes, as close to it as I have seen them. Bright and busy. Purposeful and probing. Then play stopped for a minute’s applause, players and referee included, and that elusive, enigmatic thing the pundits call form, that they looked so tantalising close to finding, decided to desert them all together. The Ministermen scored three times in the next 15 minutes and that, Clive, was very much that.

Halifax did give Eldest, his pal, and the 800 or so others in the away end a goal to cheer, but York went straight up the other end and got their fourth.

The polite chatter around the dining tables in York’s leafy suburbs this evening will though be of the couple of Halifax fans that ran on to the pitch towards the end (comically devoid of a plan as to what to do once they had). That might have been laughed off, but when bottles and a seat got thrown, the amusement around me turned to bemusement.

Tadcaster Albion 1 Penistone Church 1

28 February 2026

In between this, the second match of the day, and the first, Lincoln City Ladies U16s losing a cup tie at their York City counterparts, my Brother-in-Law and I reminisced about our respective transitions from the cozy comfort of junior football to the harsh reality of the open game.

There will be times tomorrow morning watching Eldest’s game (also an U16) when it might be tempting to think that some of them will soon be ready to make the switch. This clash, from the Northern Counties Eastern Premier League, was a reminder that, no, whilst some of them might now be big enough, they are very much not tough enough yet.

A truism dictates that a side must first win their individual battles so as to earn their team the right to play. Even if some of these lads were able to play, and with all due respect to 21 of today’s starters only the visitors’ no. 10 looked capable of doing a bit, nobody got beyond the battling stage today.

There was a bit of blood, but no thunder (a second half downpour that, like a bolt of lightning in MarioKart, added an extra dimension to the drama). There was only a solitary yellow card though. Whilst this was football at its toughest it was also a fair fight.

Penistone (10th tonight) played very marginally the better football before the break and scored thanks to tidy approach play by the aforementioned no. 10. Tadcaster (5th tonight) got a very late equaliser from a corner that Youngest and I thought them lucky to have been awarded. That being said, a boxing judge would have scored this bout evenly so it did not feel like a fortuitous point.

The Brewers were known as John Smiths Football Club upon formation in 1892. You can just about see the ground between the brewery and the River Wharfe from the A64. To have the chance to see my niece in her Lincoln shirt and to finally tick this place off made this a good Saturday indeed.

A disappointing afternoon for Halifax then, but no time spent watching people watching football is wasted time.

Cardiff City 0 Lincoln City 2

7 March 2026

Time passed very slowly this week. Whenever I looked down at the clock in the corner of my monitor it was always disappointingly only a few minutes closer to being 2:30pm this afternoon.

I could see it on my mind’s eye. 3,000 Yellowbellies in the away end hailing their heroes for leapfrogging a much heftier rival at the summit of the third tier on the day that I ticked off my 150th football ground.

So it came to pass and it was more wonderful than I imagined.

For 35 minutes Lincoln were in complete control. Their work out of possession was outstanding. They hunted in packs to close down angles and when one got a foot in their pal was there waiting to pounce on the loose ball. They retained it and they recycled it. They won, and were a threat from, set pieces. Until a 10 minute spell before the break, during which our ‘Keeper made an outstanding save, the hosts became flummoxed. Their through balls aimless. Their errors unforced.

Such is the growing stature and confidence of this Lincoln side that they seem almost able to pick their moments at will.

When I put it to Youngest that they looked a little leggy after the break they sprang up the other end and scored.

When I put it to Youngest that I would not want to spend the last twenty minutes inviting them to probe for weaknesses in our defensive lines they sprang up the other end and scored.

So instead of worrying for the last twenty minutes we sang. We sang about being at the top of the league. We sang them over the line.

It feels pivotal. It felt like Ipswich away in the Cup during the season we got promoted from the Conference. It felt like MK Dons away during the season we got promoted from League 2. It was joyous. A younger chap to my right and I shared an embrace after the second goal went in. It was overwhelming. A chap of a similar vintage directly in front of us turned around momentarily to take it all in. We exchanged a knowing nod. He also seemed to have tears in his eyes.

If time could pass both simultaneously slowly, so as to be able to take this in, and quickly, so as to be able to see what happens next, that would be just fine.

Hemel Hempstead Town 3 Chippenham Town 2

10 March 2026

I am doing a turn at a thing at Hatfield House in the morning and, lo and behold, the nearest reasonably-priced hotel tonight was in Hemel Hempstead and Hemel Hempstead Town just happened to be at home.

As I walked out of the hotel (confident, of course, that my preparation for said turn could not be better…), there were a few people dotted around the reception area watching the Champions League. I felt like pointing out to them that for the price of their tepid curry there was some red-hot non-league action going on just a 15 minute walk away. I thought better of it.

3-2 is the best possible result in football and I will be taking no further questions at this time. One never sees a bad 3-2 and tonight was no exception. Chippenham, The Bluebirds, were 2-1 up at halftime, and lost. Hemel Hempstead, ‘The Tudors’, were 2-1 down at halftime and won. Their pièce de résistance coming in stoppage time. Considering that one team is looking to go up and one team is looking to stay up there was very little in it.

As is most often the case though when watching football as a neutral, especially for anybody wanting to switch off from thinking about how to distill a 28,000 word Government consultation response submitted today into a 30 minute presentation to be given tomorrow, the real interest was off of the pitch.

The exuberant youths, a dozen or so from either side, trying to out do each other in the starting-a-chant stakes; the wives and girlfriends promised that this is a stepping stone to better things; those perhaps priced-out of watching the nearby club of their youth and who just like to come down and have a pint with their mates every couple weeks; and those with old hats and scarfs who keep the whole thing afloat.

All with nothing better to do.

Huddersfield Town 2 Lincoln City 2

18 March 2026

“That is some side you have”, offered a ‘Town fan as Youngest and I waited for Eldest and his mate outside afterwards. “Good luck in the Championship.”

This is indeed some side. There are 46 games in a season and the Mighty Imps are now unbeaten in 21 of them in a row.

I was asked about our star men by another ‘Town fan in the pub beforehand and said to him that this, in contrast perhaps to the changing room dynamics within big-spending clubs like theirs, is if not a team without ego then certainly a team without star quality.

We started on the front foot, but somehow found ourselves two down after 20 minutes. These are good sides that we are playing lest we forget. There may have been a degree of fortuitousness about the goal we got back before halftime, but it was not undeserved.

After the break there was only ever going to be one team likely to win this game and it was not them. A spell of pressure on the hour should have brought the equaliser were it not for a linesman missing a blatant handball and a goal then would surely have rendered a continued onslaught irresistible. As it transpired we had to wait until the 93rd minute to take just a point.

Again they found a way. They are so well-drilled, so proficient, so dutiful in going about their business, but, beyond technical proficiency, they are equally so emotionally committed to their joint endeavour. They have grown into this title charge as others have wilted. They look like Champions.

Just before kick off I bumped into the chap that my mate Lardy and I met on the train back to Manchester from Darlington during John Beck’s 95/96 promotion season. It is a long story as to why this chap’s Dad, from Dukinfield, supported Lincoln, but the pair of them gave the pair of us lifts to games during the remainder of our University years.

As said chap and I discussed tonight, his Dad, God rest his soul, watched Lincoln when they were last in the second tier, which was the 1960/61 season. 65 years ago. 10 years ago we were not even in the Football League. That we now are on the cusp of a Championship football is just a wonderful, wonderful thing.

Old Boltonians 3 Rochdale St Clements 4

21 March 2026

There is a six-part series on Netflix called The English Game that dramatises the birth of, well, the English game. It was created by Julian Fellowes so is very much more Downton Abbey than I.D., but it is watchable if accompanied by a bottle of wine.

It was to this time and place that the Magic Book* took Youngest and I back to this afternoon.

The FA’s first set of rules, published in 1863, were slow to catch on in Yorkshire and the Midlands where the Sheffield rules still held sway. Lancashire, when Turton FC were formed on this ground in 1871, was a rugby stronghold.

The story goes that the son of the club’s first president had just got back from Harrow and, having played under his old school’s rules initially, within a couple of years the club had adopted the ‘Rules of the London Football Association.’ Soon Christ Church FC, later Bolton Wanderers, Blackburn Rovers and the rest of the Lancashire League had done the same.

Given that Chapeltown is a Conservation Area it is not hard to imagine, if you squint and block out the parked cars, working people taking the same walk along Tower Street, with the same moors looming large in the background, to enjoy the same escape from their working week then as now.

On a gloriously sunny afternoon the visitors were one up at halftime thanks to 25-yard screamer from their string-pulling skipper. We speculated at the break as to the gap between the sides in the Lancashire Amateur League over a very quick drink in the adjacent pub, such was their dominance, but they were actually 7th and 9th at the start of play.

At 2-0, and playing nice football, they switched off took off their better players. From nowhere the hosts fashioned three chances, scored three goals, and found themselves 3-2 up. The visitors then switched back on again and won it.

It is reported that the game in some form has been played on this ground since 1856 and were I professional writer looking to add some flourish to the finish of this despatch I would speculate as to whether it is has borne witness to anything as entertaining during the last 170 years.

*British Footballs Greatest Grounds by Mike Bayly.

Golcar United 4 Parkgate 0

28 March 2026

Non-League Day was, so the internet tells me, started in 2010 by a QPR fan visiting Tavistock for a pre-season friendly. It now occurs every year during an international break to promote affordable, volunteer-led community football and to encourage fans of top teams to support their lower tier local sides.

I cannot recall watching very much non-league football, Lincoln’s sojourn in the Conference aside, pre-Covid, during which, regular readers will recall, the late night purchase of the Magic Book* inspired my epiphany (opportunities to do so now coinciding with the resurgent Lincoln actually having games postponed because of international call-ups).

I spent £20 today. It was £8 for Youngest and I to get in, £2 for two losing raffle tickets, £8 for two cans of Madri and two J20s, and £2 for a souvenir plastic cup.

This was admittedly not to visit somewhere new as on previous adventures (Youngest has played on the adjacent pitch), but for two hours of entertainment and two hours to forget about school, work and everything else going on beyond the confines of the perimeter fence it represents exceptional value.

A few of Golcar’s number were very tidy indeed and they were all bright and busy and all worked hard off the ball. Football, any locals wandering by us may have heard me pontificate after pint number one, is a simple game. If you are brighter and busier and work harder off the ball than your opponents then you more than have a chance. Parkgate showed none of these qualities and if they have tidy players they were much harder to spot. That they were only one down after the first half and still so after halfway through the second period prompted Youngest to speculate as to whether the Football Gods would punish the hosts for their profligacy.

As it turned out a Parkgate dismissal for a cynical, and likely frustrated, professional foul opened the flood gates late on and the score ended up being a fair reflection of the game.

If your team is not playing or you cannot get to see them for whatever reason then I can heartily recommend making every Saturday a Non-League Day.

*British Football’s Greatest Grounds by Mike Bayly.

Lincoln City 1 AFC Wimbledon 0

3 April 2026

After a pint with Dave and his lad in the Golden Eagle, Youngest and I made our way to the ground for another one with Lardy and Reamsey and their lads.

Lardy and I reminisced about getting to the ground ridiculously early back in the day to tear that week’s newspapers into confetti with which to greet the arrival of players.

The sides that we watched back then, bobbing around in the bottom tier, seldom merited such adulation. This side very much does.

The chatter online this week and around us this afternoon in the pub and in the Fan Zone was about the prospect of being promoted today, which was possible had results gone our way. There was a sense of occasion in the air and one sensed early on that the occasion had got to our lads a little. Yes the international break had disrupted their momentum and yes it was blowing a gale, but, a very early chance notwithstanding, they did not even get close to hitting their stride.

The Wimbledon fans that have not seen us during this unbeaten run (now 23 games and counting), their side by far the more coherent and the more threatening, had legitimate cause to ask what the fuss is all about (an enquiry they sang in less polite terms).

That was until the 88th minute when they did what winners do and, more than that, because they are winners, what we have come to expect them to do. They once again found a way to win. This is a team of champions and it is my sincere hope that, with promotion now all but assured, they, in addition to the staff responsible for overseeing this current squad and the ownership group responsible for overseeing this remarkable near decade-long ascent from the depths of the Conference, get what they deserve.

The tickets that I managed to get today just happened to be in the same stand that Lardy was in and it was nice to watch the game with him. This photograph was in fact taken from just about the same spot upon which, once upon a time, we would tear up those newspapers. The second tier then was a world away. Tonight it is a point away.

Amiens 0 Pau 1

10 April 2026

As we walked towards the ground we reminisced about how, by and large, our adventurousness abroad is usually rewarded with action and incident. The first half offered hopes tonight of being similarly so. Pau, mid-table, were busy. Amiens, relegation battlers, were very much not. The visitors scored by way of an assist from their ‘keeper and then the hosts went down to ten men by way of a challenge that looked innocuous at best.

Then the Ultras threw a few flares on to the pitch and, whilst my French extends little beyond ‘four croissants and a baguette please’, I am pretty sure they started singing something like ‘Sack Le Board’.

The second half was notable solely for Amiens missing a sitter early on. That was it. There were hopes late on that the Gods of Football would punish Pau for not killing them off, but, no the game petered out, the home fans started wandering out, and, after a few more fireworks, the likely lads at one end demanded at full time that their Captain come and explain himself. The eight away fans at the other end, in contrast, will have been delighted that they made the trip.

As we walked away from the ground, distinct, it must be noted in architectural terms, the conversation turned (given my progeny’s growing awareness of my online content) to upon what to hang a match report. Amiens are ‘The Unicorns’, a creature that does not exist. which is a bit lit, so it was noted after this showing, their hopes of staying up this season. A line that was definitely worth including.