I can't recall the last time I went to a game between the sides that was actually exciting to watch. The 2005/6 game at Gigg Lane is the closest that it has come to being an exciting game. The Imps dominated that game and scored one of the, if not the best free kick that the club has ever scored, we had two goals disallowed, hit the wood-work and yet somehow Bury managed to equalise with one of their very few attacks during the game.

If anything, Bury are the one side who the Imps play on a regular basis that you can very rarely see City gaining any points against. Even when we took the lead against them on New Year's Day this year, the Imps never looked like winning and a typical Ben Smith mistake let Bury get an undeserved equaliser.

The Imps are riding high on top of a confident victory over Barnet last week and especially the performances of Dany N'Guessan, Adrian Patulea and Lenell John-Lewis, all three of whom are in line for a start against Bury. However, the only one likely to start is Dany N'Guessan due to Jackson's seeming reluctance to see that neither Ben Wright or Kevin Gall are performing. That means that they are likely to start up front against the Shakers.

Rob Burch will be aiming for his second clean sheet in a row and assuming that all are fit, the front line in front of him will probably remain exactly the same, with Paul Green at right back, Lee Beevers on the left and Kovacs and Sinclair in the middle. Then again, whether that defence will be able to cope with a team that I'm assuming will want to attack is another matter.

The midfield isn't exactly difficult to forsee with Frecklington, Kerr, Oakes and the aforementioned N'Guessan in the middle.

Bury have made an excellent start to the season, remaining undefeated up until now and it's a similar story to how the Imps started the 2006/7 season, a good omen for the Imps is that City lost their first game on the same weekend in that season. Whether the current Imps' squad is as good as that MK Dons squad is very open to debate.

In terms of the squad, Bury are developing quite a decent side with the ever-dangerous Andy Bishop spearheading the Shaker's line up, one of the few decent things that Chris Casper did for them. It is a squad that is capable of challenging for at least a playoff spot, but Bury have had this problem for a lot of the recent seasons and haven't really been the same since Andy Preece left the managerial spot in December 2006.

Whether Bury can maintain their good start to the season is a good question and they will certainly have to keep it up throughout if they are intending on troubling the promotion spots this year.

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