From one extreme to the other as City go to Cheltenham

After facing a Stockport side who most Lincoln fans would have been confident of beating, the Imps now travel to arguably our biggest bogey side, Cheltenham Town. The Imps have an awful record against Cheltenham and especially at Whaddon Road.

I started following the Imps full time way back on September 16th 2000. That day we secured a respectable 1-1 draw with eventually promoted Blackpool and one of the first wins I saw was against Cheltenham in October of that year.....since then I have seen us play Cheltenham 9 times, all ending in defeat and we have only lead once during all of those nine games. They are well and truly one of our bogey sides.

A trip to Whaddon Road is not the best fixture at the best of times, let alone when you're bottom of the League, however, the Imps head to Gloucestershire on the back of a performance that has raised optimism amongst City fans. The 4-3 scoreline wasn't a general reflection on the game as City could have scored at least six on Saturday afternoon, but a win of any scoreline after being on 19 points since November 20th was always going to be welcome.

Despite still being bottom of the table, the decent performance has renewed the optimism that the Imps could beat the drop and a win at Cheltenham would move City above Stockport and Barnet by a point with numerous games in hand on both. A win guarantees City move out of the relegation zone, with the realistic highest position can go is 21st, although a win of more than 12 goals would see City move to 20th....but I don't see that happening anytime soon.

However, we certainly shouldn't underestimate our Playoff chasing opponents, whom will be desperate for the three points themselves as they could go as high as fourth with victory, a big jump from their current position of ninth.

Mustapha Carayol is out following the injury he picked up at Stockport and he joins Clark Keltie and Gavin Hoyte on the starting line up. That could lead the way to a rare start for Scott Kerr, whom has come on early as an early substitute in both of the last two games.

Other than that it should be an unchanged line up for the Imps. Interestingly, if Grimes scores twice in his next three games then he would have achieved nine goals for the Imps quicker than any striker for quite some time, even quicker than Davide Somma, who scored nine in fourteen....Grimes is currently at seven in ten.

City have a horrible recent history against Cheltenham, especially away from home. City have returned pointless from Gloucestershire on the last six occasions. Last season saw an even game decided by a Julian Alsop tap in, but the game at Sincil Bank was far more memorable. Jamie Clarke had equalised with what would turn out to be his only goal for the Imps, Justin Richards had opened the scoring. A sending off for Aaron Brown resulted in a mass brawl on the bench that eventually saw Ian Pearce, Chris Sutton and Cheltenham's Barry Richardson all sent to the stands.

That was the first meeting since two quickfire games in 2005/6. Cheltenham's Kayode Odejayi scored with one of Cheltenham's rare attacks at Sincil Bank, but the return game at Whaddon Road six weeks later was far less even. Guinan opened the scoring before Mayo equalised. Luke Foster had a brilliant effort tipped over the bar before a brace from Brian Wilson and a late Gillespie effort secured the big win for the hosts . That defeat came on November 18th and the Imps would only lose one game between then and March 18th.

Even goals against Cheltenham are generally rare for the Imps, with the last time City scored more than one against Cheltenham coming in 2004, when City were 2-1 up with three minutes to go and still lost 3-2. Judging by recent history alone, a draw would be a good result for the Imps.

Since the turn of the millenium we have shared Lee Ridley,  Aaron Lescott, John Finnigan (left), Aaron Brown and Paul Connor. Connor was far from a popular figure at Cheltenham or the Imps, playing a combined 108 times for both teams and scoring just eight goals, all of which were for Cheltenham. Former Lincoln manager John Schofield was a coach at Cheltenham under Martin Allen.

Cheltenham are having a decent season after several years of struggle and are a far cry from the team that barely avoided the drop last season. They are aiming for a third promotion since entering the Football League in 1999, however, their promotion in 2005/6 via the Playoffs was the only time in the last eight seasons where they have recorded a top half finish in any division. They have already won as many games this season as they did in the whole of last season.

Recent results have been poor though with only four League wins since the end of October, that run also includes losing three of their last four home matches. However, the did secure three points at the weekend with a respectable win at free-falling Port Vale.

Their strike force is very potent, with Wesley Thomas and Jeff Goulding hitting 22 beetween them, an impressive total indeed. However, if you keep them quiet than Cheltenham don't tend to win. Their last victory without either scoring came in a 2-0 win at Macclesfield on November 23rd.

Cheltenham will definitely be without Andy Gallinagh, whilst Martin Riley is also likely to miss the match.