Lincoln City versus Grimsby Town is the oldest and, certainly in years gone by, the most eagerly awaited derby clash of any we play. Meetings on a competitive level date back to our very first season of 1884/85 and in all we have met over 260 times over the years.
The first meeting was in the FA Cup in January 1885 when Harry Mundahl scored the only goal at Clee Park. We met on a regular basis in the FA Cup in the 19th Century with Town knocking us out on nine occasions without a single Imps win. October 1895 saw Grimsby win 2-0 at John O'Gaunts with their players having to flee to the changing room shed at the final whistle as City fans chased them off the pitch. The Town players were only rescued from the shed when some of their own fans set on the City supporters with sticks and lumps of timber! On the pitch Matthew Mullen scored three against us in 1892 (5-0) and Tommy McCairns twice scored hat-tricks for the Mariners at Sincil Bank in our 5-2 defeat in 1893 and a 4-2 defeat in 1895.
November 1911 saw us finally knock Town out of the competition with a 3-2 home win thanks to two goals from Alex McCubbin and one from Walter Miller. It was even more ironic as we were in the Central League and Grimsby the Second Division at the time. Since all those pre-Great War meetings we have only met once since in the FA Cup, a 3-1 City win in front of 21,757 at Sincil Bank in December 1951.
Not surprisingly, meetings in the Lincolnshire Cup account for over 70 of the games between us. In the early years the competition was taken much more seriously than now as proved when the first meeting in March 1886 ended 1-1 at Clee Park in front around 5,000 supporters, one of the largest crowd at that time to watch a match there. A dispute followed over whether extra-time (City wanted to, Town refused) should be played which led to both the Lincolnshire and Football Associations being involved, Town eventually being awarded the tie. The following season we won the cup for the first time beating Town 2-0 at Gainsborough in a final replay.
There have been some high scoring games over the years in the competition with five Town players scoring hat-tricks and two, Joe Robson in 1930 and Ron Rafferty in 1960, scoring six in a game. No Imp has scored three in a game but our 7-0 win in 1920 is the biggest winning margin between us in the competition.
The first league meetings between us took place in the Football Alliance in 1891/92 with City winning 3-2 at home (Walker with two and James Gresham). Jack Ackroyd scored four though as we lost 6-1 away later in the season. We still finished the season one place higher than our rivals.
The 1892/93 season saw us both founder members of the Football League Second Division and we went on to meet 36 times before the First World War with both of us losing our League status in that period (Town actually won theirs back at our expense in 1911). The Mariners certainly enjoyed more success in this period winning 17 times with 10 City successes and nine draws. We failed to keep a clean sheet until the 22nd meeting as McCairns scored four in 1895 (and eight in total against us) and Robert Gray (1897), George Ratcliffe (1899), Walter Leigh (1900) and George Rampton (1915) all scored hat-tricks. No City player managed to score one hat-trick! Our best results were two goal away wins in 1893 (4-2), 1908 (2-0) and 1914 (3-1) whilst at home it was 3-0 in 1913.
Three of the 36 matches finished up 10 a side as John Irving (believed to be our first Football League dismissal) and Tom Frith were sent off for fighting in our 3-0 away defeat in November 1894 whilst Charles Bannister and George Mountain went for the same reason in the 1-1 away draw in March 1899. The third match also saw two players take early baths for fighting as this time Alex McCubbin and Frank Martin came to blows in our 3-0 win in 1913.
The Great War saw us meet 16 times, Town continuing to dominate with 10 wins and two draws. Only once did we score more than one goal in a game and that was in our only away win by 2-1 in February 1919. Fred Ward and R. Ward scored the goals, ironically the only goals both players scored in the war-time period.
The inter-war period saw a further 16 Football League meetings and again we generally suffered as we won just four times although six games were drawn. The 1919/20 season saw us draw 2-2 at Blundell Park and win 2-0 at Sincil Bank and finish one off the bottom with Grimsby below us and yet we got voted out of the Football League and Grimsby stayed in! James Carmichael enjoyed playing against City in the 1920's scoring 12 times (one hat-trick) in 10 games against us. One of his goals came at Sincil Bank on October 24th 1925 watched by a then record crowd for us of 13,078. Two goals for Harry Havelock and one each for Archibald Campbell and Richard Merritt at least ensured most went home happy though with our 4-1 win.
Even more people (14,102 although it just failed to become another new record crowd) saw our 6-3 success at Sincil Bank in October 1932 as Frank Keetley, Allan Hall and Jack Wilkinson all scored twice. Dennis Jennings became the seventh Town hat-trick scorer against us with all three in the 3-3 draw there later that season, a result that was repeated at Sincil Bank the following season when we finished bottom of Division 2 and Town won the title.
World War 2 saw 29 meetings between us with just four City wins! Guest player from Leeds United Bill Dunderdale scored a hat-trick for us in our 4-1 home win in March 1940 and later on in the war scored four times against us for the Mariners. All seven goals in our 5-2 win at Sincil Bank in October 1944 were scored by red and white striped players with Sheffield United's Colin Collindridge scoring twice (in his only guest appearance for us), John Douglas (from Hartlepool), Joe Clare and H. Acton for us whilst Billy Bean and Bert Johnston scored own goals for Grimsby!
Jock Dodds scored twice on his debut in the first post WW2 meeting as we drew 2-2 at Blundell Park whilst our current record Football League crowd of 23,146 saw us lose 3-2 at Sincil Bank in March 1949. Dodds and George Eastham scored for us but Tom Briggs became another Town hat-trick man in reply.
The 1951/52 campaign saw us beat Town to the Division 3 North title, by three points, with both sides winning away whilst the meeting in September 1957 again saw two players dismissed for fighting as Joe Buick became our first post war dismissal as he walked with John Scott. Town won 4-1 but they didn't win at Sincil Bank again in the Football League until 13 meetings later.
Town were relegated in 1958/59 but the game at Sincil Bank saw us record one of only five 4-4 draws we have had in Football League history. Jack Grainger (2), Bert Linnecor and Don Dykes scored for us with Ron Rafferty scoring all four for Grimsby!
Cliff Portwood bagged a hat-trick as we slid down to Division 4, his coming in our 4-1 defeat at Blundell Park in October 1961. Town joined us in Division 4 in 1968/69 and we met in each of the next four seasons and for once we enjoyed the upper hand winning five and drawing three. Town lost at Sincil Bank 3-0 in 1968/69 (Peter Kearns, Jack Lewis & Dave Smith), 1970/71 (Percy Freeman 2 and Phil Hubbard) and 1971/72 (Frank McMahon, Hubbard & Freeman) but they finished champions that season with us in fifth place and missing out on promotion by one point.
The 1970/71 season saw our first League Cup meetings as we won 2-1 at Sincil Bank in a first round tie with our only other meeting in the competition also in the first round as we lost 2-1 to a last minute Jonathan Rowan goal in Cleethorpes in 2001/02. Our next meetings came in 1976/77 and a rare City double (only our third to Town's eight) as we followed a 2-0 home win with a 2-1 Blundell Park success.
We didn't meet again in the Football League until Boxing Day 1988 (although we beat Town 2-1 at Sincil Bank in a Football League Trophy tie in August 1982) when Paul Smith and Gordon Hobson scored for us at Sincil Bank whilst Tommy Watson and Keith Alexander scored for the Mariners. Alexander was again on the mark at Sincil Bank the following season with Paul Smith again scoring for us. Ex-Imp Dave Gilbert scored the only goal from the penalty spot in the away game.
Town's stint in the higher divisions meant another long gap between Football League meetings.
Simon Yeo became the first Football League hat-trick scorer for us against the Mariners in our 4-2 away success in January 2005, Ciaran Toner scoring the other, whilst the following season on a dreadful night weather wise Toner scored for the Mariners against us in our 3-0 defeat. Town's visit at Sincil Bank in March 2006 will live long in the memory of Imps' fans as we stormed into a 4-0 first half lead thanks to Luke Foster, Jamie Forrester, Paul Mayo (pen) and Marvin Robinson. Town manager Russell Slade held his half-time team talk on the pitch much to our amusement but all we added in the second half was a goal from Lee Beevers.
Grimsby got revenge though by beating us in the Play-Offs 3-1 on aggregate. Gary Jones scored in both legs as well as getting sent off with ex-Imp Ben Futcher also scoring. Marvin Robinson scored for us in the 2-1 second leg defeat. Jones was again dismissed in our 2-0 win at Sincil Bank in the 2006/07 season (Forrester and Lee Frecklington) whilst we drew 0-0 at Blundell Park in the final away game of the season. We also met at Sincil Bank in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy when, after a goalless 90 minutes, Town won 5-3 on penalties with just Forrester missing.
The meetings in 2007/08 both ended in Grimsby victories with another Ciaran Toner effort, this time from the spot, enough to separate the sides at Sincil Bank after goals from Justin Whittle and Forrester had seen the sides go into the break on level terms whilst at Blundell Park, Scott Kerr was sent off for City as a late Gary Jones goal secure the win for the Mariners.
The following campaign saw the teams fight out a 1-1 draw at Sincil Bank with Lee Frecklington earning City a point from the penalty spot after Peter Till had given the Mariners an early lead but the return fixture turned out to be an afternoon to forget for the Imps. After Dany N'Guessan had levelled from the spot after Adam Proudlock had given the Mariners a first half lead, the game seemed to be heading for another draw but four Grimsby goals in the last 12 minutes made for a flattering scoreline. Proudlock led the way with two more whilst Jean-Louis Akpa-Akpro also added a brace.
Our last Football League meetings came in the 2009/10 season with both games ending in draws. Whilst the game at Sincil Bank finished goalless, the return fixture in Cleethorpes was an incident-packed affair which saw the teams share four goals. Two Lee Peacock goals either side of the break had seen the hosts cancel out an early Chris Herd effort before Brian Gilmour levelled after he followed up his saved penalty and with Adam Watts being stretchered off with a broken leg, only the crossbar denied assistant manager Ian Pearce in the closing stages.
Adapted from an original article by Gary Parle
