City's recent record against the Shrews is fairly decent, we've won 5 of the last 8 league games against them, but only 1 of those wins came at home and it's fairly regular for the Imps to struggle to get results at home to the men from New Meadow.

The Imps' only home win over the Shrews in that time came in the 2004/5 season when Green and Yeo both pounced for City in the first twenty minutes to gain 3 of the more comfortable points that season. The two games since have been dominated by the Imps, but a mix of luck and pure determination has stopped Shrewsbury leaving with heavy defeats on those visits.

The games at Gay Meadow were often the exact opposite, with Shrewsbury destroying the Imps in every department but just not scoring the goals, then the Imps will go down the other end and score with their only shot on goal. Last season it was Lee Frecklington who scored the winner at Gay Meadow, before he then opened the scoring at Sincil Bank before Shrewsbury scored out of no-where. That goal helped them maintain an unbeaten run that saw them gained a +22 goal difference and get them into the playoffs.

Both sides will be hoping to be involved in a promotion push again, with the Imps determined to FINALLY win that spot in League 1 next season.

City will start the new season with only one player confirmed out and that is last season's player of the season, Lee Beevers. He will replaced by either Adie Moses or Phil Watt, more than likely the latter due to the former's injury proneness. Whoever replaces him will more than likely partner Nat Brown in the centre, with Gary Croft and Ryan Amoo either side.

The midfield is also hard to predict, with only Scott Kerr and Lee Frecklington guaranteed places. Other than them that other 2 places (assuming we're going 4-4-2) are to be fought out between Dany N'Guesan, Ben Wright, Louis Dodds and Owain Warlow. If pre-season is anything to go by then it is likely to be the semmingly guaranteed starter Dany N'Guessan on the right with Ben Wright on the left.

The strike partnership will also almost certainly be Forrester and Stallard, although the aforementioned Dodds and Torpey could push for a start.

Shrewsbury have a few problems regarding injuries and suspensions. Neil Ashton, Luke Jones, Dave Hibbert and Ben Davies are all injured and Marc Tierney is suspended. Other than that they have a seemingly full squad to pick from.

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