On a cold brisk Saturday afternoon Lincoln City played host to Alfreton Town in the FA Trophy. With both teams looking to progress to the next round the match promised much excitement.
Lincoln City started out positively with a high energy and dictating the tempo for the first 10 minutes, Alfreton committed numerous fouls to disrupt the promising play by Lincoln. The first real chance came about when Hamza Bencherif was able to latch onto a loose ball in the opposition 18 yard box and turned his defender to get a shot away that was saved.
There were several more attempts made by Lincoln as they enjoyed most of the possession but were unable to break Alfreton down and create any clear cut chances. Most of the efforts made by Lincoln were shots from range; Ben Tomlinson had a good attempt from range but was placed too close to the keeper.
On the 18th minute Alfreton were able to take the advantage by scoring a real poachers effort, when Anthony Howell saw his attempt parried away but Luke Graham was the quickest player off the mark to latch onto the loose ball and bury it into the back of the net.
The goal saw an instant change in Lincoln looking for a quick reply that almost arrived when Marcus Marshall header that looked destined for the top right corner was pushed away by the keeper. The physical play by Alfreton did nothing to help Lincolns flow of play to get themselves back into the game.
Most of the success Lincoln had was coming from going down the flanks but sadly their crossing just wasn’t good enough on the night to get anything from it. Some clever improvising by Tomlinson from a drilled cross around the 6 yard box saw him come close with a flick on but it wasn’t meant to be.
Going into the second half Alfreton Town were leading 1-0 against Lincoln City. At the restart Lincoln started out positively again taking control of the game and forcing the matter against Alfretons defense. Some good play by Lincoln saw them threaten and score only for it to be disallowed because of a foul against the Alfreton keeper.
Soon after though they threatened again when a ball was played into the 6 yard box where Tomlinson and Jordan Burrow were caught up in the scramble to get the loose ball but were both unable to before it got cleared by the defense.
On the 63rd minute Alfreton doubled their lead by scoring from some great counter attacking play. The quick play and some luck saw John Jonhnston square the ball across for an easy attempt on goal for Tom Shaw who made no mistake placing it impeccably into the back of the net.
More physical play by both sides ensured that the game didn’t have any really flow to it which benefitted Alfreton Town who were slowly wasting time to work out the result and round off a frustrating afternoon for Lincoln.