The Imps kicked off attacking the Imps Stand End. After a very patient first minute of play, without Rochdale touching the ball, Simon Yeo eventually ended up with the ball but his weak shot trickled wide with Edwards even bothering to move to go and get it.

It was a typical Tuesday night in Lincoln as City were struggling to make an impact but were still outclassing Rochdale overwhelmingly and after 8 minutes, Rochdale had only touched the ball a small handful of times. The next oppurtunity came Simon Yeo's way but he headed Kevin Sandwith's cross way over the bar.

Rochdale finally spend more than 5 seconds in the Lincoln half and forced a corner after a shot took a deflection of Futcher and almost went in, infact, the Rochdale fans were cheering because it looked at first, like it had gone in. The corner however, failed to mount to anything.

The ball went straight up the other end and poor defending by Greg Heald saw the Imps gain a corner. Green took it and McAuley headed it down for Yeo out on the right but his reluctance to cross the ball saw him take the ball around some defenders before eventually getting tackled and the ball was cleared to safety.

The best chance of the half came in the 15th minute and a 3 on 2 attack occured. Gain made an outside run and Yeo played the through ball but Peter Gain's shot was met by an excellent save by Edwards, the ball spilled and Yeo pounced but yet again, Edwards got in the way of the shot and forced a corner that came to nothing.

The half slowed down drastically and nothing else of note happened before the two teams emerged for the second half. The first few minutes were very very mixed with neither team taking a strong hold. City gained a free kick just inside the Rochdale half, it was floated in and Futcher headed it on and Bloomer ran through unchallenged to slot the ball into the corner of the net to give the Imps a 1-0 lead after 50 minutes.

It was still quite a poor game with no real zest or ergency from either side to get forward and City had what few chances there were. A Yeo cross went over everybody in the box and it looked like Martin Carruthurs had scored for the Imps but the presence of the large Burgess put Carruthurs off and his shot that seemed destined for the back of the net sailed just wide.

Rochdale were slowly pulling themselves into the game but we definatly not creating anything decent. A corner from Grant Holt was shot wide by Weller.

It looked as though City were heading for their third win in a row but in typical City fashion, it didn't work out that way. A long ball into the City box saw Futcher struggle to clear and with 3 Rochdale players around and no other City defender doing anything but watching, Jamie Clarke stole the ball and shot past Marriott to give the visitors a point they definatly didn't deserve with less than 5 minutes to go.

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