THE66POW: Mansfield Town 1 v Lincoln City 1

Tuesday 6th March 2018

SkyBet EFL League Two

at the One Call Stadium/Field Mill

Mansfield Town (0) 1
Joel Byrom 49

Lincoln City (0) 1
Ollie Palmer 90

Admission £20. Programme £3.
Attendance 6,091

Since my last visit to Field Mill, when Mansfield Town comfortably beat Newport County 5-0, the Stags management duo at that time, have decided to up sticks and move on to Peterborough United.
Oh well... life will go on regardless, so let's get on with it.
David Flitcroft and his assistant (the former Mansfield Town loan player) Ben Futcher (thirteen appearances in 2011), have made the switch from Swindon Town take over the reigns at Field Mill... and tonight marked their first game in charge at their new club.
Welcome to the house of fun, I hope you both enjoy your stay.

Along with a number of other clubs, Futcher also played for tonight's visitors Lincoln City, as did Flitcroft, albeit just the twice, while on he was on loan at the Imps in 1993.
I have unearthed a THE66POW blog report from the game that Futcher scored his only goal for the Stags in.
It was an away fixture against Barrow, in the Blue Square Bet Premier (Conference) which can be viewed by left clicking HERE. For the record, the game at Barrow, was also the very first football match that a young lady called Carolyn, attended with her future husband... namely, the Mansfield Town chairman, John Radford.
Doesn't time fly!?

Back in August, the Imps won 3-1 at Mansfield, in a Checkatrade EFL Trophy group match, on a night that a second half goal apiece from former Stags players Ollie Palmer and Matt Green (in the 95th minute) won the game for the visitors, after the teams had gone in 1-1 at half time; with Alfie Potter opening the scoring and Elliott Whitehouse grabbing an equaliser for Lincoln, just before the interval.
Lincoln have now reached the final of that competition, where they will face Shrewsbury Town (who won tonight's semi-final against Yeovil Town), at Wembley Stadium, on Sunday 8th April.

Since the aforementioned Stags v Newport game, tonight's hosts have picked up four more points, by virtue of a 1-0 win at Exeter City and a 1-1 draw against Coventry City on home turf.
While Danny Cowley's side went into tonight's game off the back of two defeats: 3-1 at Crawley town and 4-1 at home against Crewe Alexandra.
Both sides had a blank weekend, due to both of their respective away games being postponed, because of problems caused by the weather, as something called 'the beast from the east' arrived unceremoniously towards the end of last week and caused several days of snow chaos.

On Sunday, a army of Stags supporters (and the new management team) had turned out to clear snow from the pitch, to make sure that this game would go ahead, much kudos and respect to them all I say.

The last time these two teams met, the Stags won 1-0 at Sincil Bank in September, with a 61st minute headed goal by Danny Rose, shortly after he had been introduced into the fray from the subs bench.

The form between these local(ish) rivals, indicated that it would be a close game to call tonight... and so it turned out to be, in an often steady and seldom spectacular kind of way.

It was a competitive and compelling enough contest to be fair, even though, if truth be told, it was bereft of much in the way of subtlety and ingenuity.
But teamwork, organisation and hard graft were very much in evidence and on the agenda for these two sides, who know each other so well... and to that end you couldn't fault a single player out on the pitch, regardless of the colour of the shirt they were wearing, for the effort that they put in.
Even though the game would've benefited as a spectacle, from a few moments of individual flair.

All told, this was a game of strategy, football chess I suppose you could say, for want of a better subjective adjective... and I also think it would be fair to say, that neither team could be accused of taking any risks tonight. On the whole, a draw was probably just about a fair result.
That said, Lincoln definitely had the better of the opening twenty minutes or so, and you could probably say the same about the closing ten minutes too.
Ex-Stags striker Matt Rhead, y'know the one that a whole load of Mansfield fans rubbish, and claim that he's past it and only good enough for the Confrerence; well him... he inevitably put in a dominant display in and around the hosts goalmouth. His manager and doubt, the player himself, are aware of his weaknesses and limitations, but play to his strengths, like the Imps did tonight and he's a thorn in the (back)side for any defence to deal with at this level.

Rhead's striking partner Matt Green, another player who served Mansfield Town well, before the previous manager at the club started to play him out of position, both stifling his input and undermining his effectiveness, as a means to justify bombing him out of the club altogether, was given a generous round of applause by a large number of Stags fans as he emerged onto the pitch, to which he responded in kind.
But still, there was a section of fans up to my left in the Quarry Lane End who booed his every touch.
Did 'Greeny' really warrant any kind of abuse?
I would definitely say: no effing way!

Still available in the Stags shop for £5

Of course, you should always support your own team and never encourage the opposition; but some people have very short memories and though I wouldn't advocate anybody cheering a player from the other team... apart from perhaps Phil Stant, when he returned to Field Mill in October 1995 with Bury and effectively dismantled Mansfield single-handedly, while scoring a hat trick along the way, in a 5-1 win for the Shakers; but he refused to

celebrate any of his goals, in a show of mutual respect, for old times sake. A week later at Preston North End battered the Stags 6-1, with another former striker, Steve Wilkinson finding the net four times, but he didn't get any applause from the travelling fans who'd made their way up to Deepdale... I thought the treatment dished out to Matt Green was unnecessary (at best) and completely void of any kind of class whatsoever.
For the record, Stant also ended up at Lincoln, and even managed them for a while.

The Imps, whose captain tonight: Luke Waterfall, used to be on the Stags books, had a third former Mansfield striker: Ollie Palmer, sitting on the bench, but to be fair, judging by his performances under Paul Cox at Mansfield, when he was struggling for both form and fitness, sitting the game out was probably the best option for him. Hmm, famous last words r us, eh!?.
During the opening exchanges, Rhead directed a header on target from a looooong punt forward, that had me

checking the visitors technical area to see if John 'Mr Hoofball' Beck, had been reinstated as their manager, but Conrad Logan was well placed to hold the ball and stop it sneaking in by the post.
Then Rhead threatened again, but doesn't get as much power behind his shots as he does those frequent towering headers and Mal Benning cleared a rather tame effort away as it touch a deflection past Logan.
Alex Woodyard was recklessly scythed down by Adam King, with barely ten minutes on the clock and the Stags player was booked as a consequence.

The away end...
the roads around Mansfield were snarled up with tractors tonight

Danny Rose had a decent chance for the hosts, but couldn't keep the ball on target, and shortly afterwards, Logan was forced into pulling off a great save to keep out Waterfall's low stinging leffort.
Sam Habergham, was providing Rhead with plenty of ammunition, with a succession of lofted balls into the Stags area, while the midfield was so congested that it seemed as if both teams had fielded fifteen players each. I'm pretty sure that the match referee: Graham Salisbury,

probably wouldn't have noticed, given a good number of other stuff that he didn't spot over the course of the game.
Alex MacDonald shot wide from distance on one of his rare forward runs into Imps territory. The visitors were obviously aware that when MacDonald plays well, then so do Mansfield Town, so they kept a close watch on the creative midfielder throughout, even though he appeared to be employed in a deeper role than usual, stifling the visiting midfield's attempts to employ a pressing game, in a attempt to frustrate and constrict Flitcroft's team, who had to operate, in the main, inside their own half.

The visitors went close, when Scott Wharton picked out the human lighthouse that is Rhead, who knocked the ball down to Jordan Williams, whose angled shot across the face of goal skimmed narrowly wide of the far post.
HT: Imps 0 v Stags 0
Half time and the opening moments of the second half marked two milestone firsts for the Stags.
Adam King, already sitting on a yellow card, was substituted at the interval, as a precautionary measure, given that the 'battle for midfield supremacy' was living up to it's name and although it was more of a case of a bit of 'rough and ready' between two highly charged and committed teams than anything overly brutal (apart from Kings lunge on Woodyard), that spirit of avoiding risk taking obviously had to be bought into play, hence King not appearing for the second half.

The 'inspired' introduction of Joel Byrom, was the first ever substitution that Flitcroft had made as the manger of Mansfield Town and the goal that the 'sub' scored four minutes later, with a deftly flicked header from Haydn White's delivery from the right, that beat Ryan Allsop at the near post, was the Byrom's first ever goal for the club.

Matt Green cleared the bar with a bicycle kick from on the edge of the six yard box after Rhead had set him up, and at the other end, Benning took a corner out on the left, that found it's way back to him via Rhys Bennett, but his shot from fifteen yards ended up towards the back of the Quarry Lane End.

It looked as though Mansfield were holding out for a hard won three points, but as they defended ever deeper as the game careered towards its conclusion, a Lincoln substitute, who had been sent on late in the game to replace Matt Green, latched onto yet another Rhead header across the face of Logan's goal from Neal Eardley's cross and crashed a volley into the back of the Stags net to level things up inside the last minute of the scheduled ninety.

His name was... Ollie Palmer, of course.

And did Palmer run behind the goal to celebrate his last gasp equaliser with the 1700+ Imps fans who were going bananas in the away end?

Did he chuffing 'ell as like! Instead he sprinted forty yards towards the West Stand and slid on his knees towards the home supporters, gloating, antagonising and giving it 'the big one' in a provocative manner. What a completely stupid thing for him to do.

Alas, his taunting was met by a plastic bottle being launched in Palmer's direction as his teammates rushed across to celebrate with him... no doubt the Stags will be in trouble for that now and I hope that they've collared the culprit. But, in an instant, things went from bad to worse, when the visitors skipper, Luke Waterfall, picked up the said bottle and instead of handing it to the referee, threw it back into the crowd in the general direction from which it had just come.

Three wrongs will never make a right, regardless of how much emotions tend to spill over after a last ditch goal... and the referee was left with no alternative but to show Waterfall a straight red card; while each of the guilty parties will now have to wait and see what further punishment will surely be heading their way any time soon, for their part in the whole debacle.

Less than two minutes after the bottle throwing incident, Rhys Bennett was also shown a red card, for a second bookable offence, when he went in heavily on Palmer.

The middle of the pitch was certainly less congested now.

What a curious way those final few minutes were to bring the curtain down on a game of association football.

FT: Mansfield Town 1 v Lincoln City 1

Mansfield are next in action against Colchester United, at home, on Saturday.
While Lincoln travel to Chesterfield, looking to hammer a few more nails in the Spireites relegation coffin... I've got a really big hammer if they want to borrow it.