City kicked off and despite giving the ball away before it even left the centre circle, Alan Power won the ball back and hit a shot that was charged down. Lloyd hit a shot wide for the hosts before the Imps took the least in the 10^th minute as Thompson fed Laurent in, he in turn played a through ball to Jamie Taylor and the Imps striker scored his first goal for the Imps give the Imps the lead.

Several Imps corners followed before a controversial moment saw Laurent chase a ball forward, only to be shoulder barged off of the ball by McEvilly (and not elbowed as reported on the official site – I was five feet away from the challenge and there was no elbow). The referee didn’t hesitate and showed the red card to McEvilly, much to the shock of most of the ground as the challenge was barely worth of a yellow.

City won corner after corner and forced Cudworth into a good save when Taylor was again played through by Laurent. It wasn’t long though before the Imps gained a two goal lead as Power and Christophe combined to give the ball to Platt, he controlled and his a left shoot thunderbolt into the net from 20 yards.

Taylor had a header blocked by Hughes and Christophe had a downward header brilliantly saved by Cudworth, before he denied Laurent minutes later. The first half ended soon afterwards and the hosts were thankful to Cudworth, the goalkeeper was single handedly stopping it from being 4 or 5-0 by half time.

Cudworth saved a Nutter effort before Power headed wide. A rare attack from the hosts saw Evans have a shot easily saved by Anyon.

Sheridan replaced Power before another controversial moment as Rob Hopley ran through on goal, only for the referee to adjudge that Joe Anyon had fouled the Colwyn Bay man, and much like the sending off, it was a foul that virtually no-one other than the referee seemed to see. McLachlan scored the resultant penalty.

Russell replaced Laurent for City and the Imps restored the two goal lead within minutes as Taylor hit an impressive effort from the edge of the area to make it 3-1. Hinds, Nicolau and Sheridan all had efforts saved for the Imps and a game that could have seen City produce a rout only ended 3-1.

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