Had it not being for Gary Silk doing the Imps’ a favour and injuring Simon Yeo, City would never have brought in Jamie Forrester on loan from promotion rivals, Bristol Rovers. The former Auxerre, Leeds, Scunthorpe, Grimsby Town, Southend United, Walsall and Northampton Town striker had joined the Imps after finding himself shut out at the Memorial Stadium.

There are few who’ve had a better debut than the one Forrester had at City as he lined up against one of his former sides. Grimsby Town were flying high and hot favourites to beat City after easily beating them at Christmas, however, after Jamie Forrester had set 2 goals up and scored 1 himself, City ran out comfortable 5-0 winners. Forrester would score 4 more times before his loan deal was set to expire, however, it was announced that Forrester would not only extend his loan deal, but also sign on a permanent basis. The goals dried up after that was announced however.

Jamie's permanent career at Sincil Bank did start a bit slowly, but a 4 goal haul at Mansfield changed that. Jamie went on to score a further two hatricks in the 2006/7 season and he scored a very impressive 18 goals during his first full season at the club, forming a deadly partnership with Mark Stallard.

However, Forrester's contribution to the team certainly wasn't restricted to goalscoring, he was instrumental in setting up chances for his fellow strikers and he was arguably our most valuable player. Two of his more impressive assists were an overhead kick against MK Dons to set up Lee Beevers, that followed a back heel into the path of Scott Kerr just a few days earlier.

The 2007/8 season was another good season for Forrester. He scored 14 goals for the Imps in a season where it had appeared he would get sacked due to off the field problems. Those rumours never came to materialise and he form a fairly decent partnership with Ben Wright, the strikers scoring 29 goals between them.

Jamie left sincil Bank in the summer of 2008. He was offered a new contract by the club but he decided to join Notts County instead. Forrester left Sincil Bank having scored 37 goals over his two spells. City had better be careful in the future as he has a habit of scoring against his former sides. He scored against Grimsby in each of the three seasons he was at Sincil Bank, also scoring a winning goal over Bristol Rovers in 2006/7.

Forrester was also kind enough to do an interview for this site just before he left. You can find that interview here.

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