Danny Cowley has enjoyed the start to pre-season as the Imps approach the 2019/20 SkyBet League One campaign following their promotion last season.
City have won three of their opening four matches after returning from the summer break. The Imps first defeat came against Steve Bruce’s Sheffield Wednesday side on Saturday as Lincoln lost 3-1, the only goal scorer for City being young forward Jordan Adebayo-Smith who netted his fourth goal of pre-season.
The City boss explained how he enjoys playing top sides over pre-season as it is a real test of quality: “We learn much more when we play against the top teams and I enjoyed it much more than the three previous wins we have had.
“When you are playing against a team with the quality Sheffield Wednesday have, you can’t give them a start like we did after a minute.”
Cowley continued by speaking about the trialists who have spent time with the first team so far over the summer.
“I thought that the trialists did well when they came on,” said the City manager.
“They are athletic boys who have come through high quality development setups and we have enjoyed having them with us. We will have to look what we can do financially because we want a squad of 20 to 22 and we are short in certain areas.
“We will use the loan market wisely, I feel that we need a different option to what we have already but only time will tell if we can get that. We will try to encourage the players that we would like.
“We have good relationships with a number of clubs who respect that this is a good environment for young players to develop and we hope that they can take a look at it in the long term.”
However, The City boss soon turned his attention to the Imps pre-season training camp in Spain explaining how it will help the sides preparation following an intensive two weeks.
“It will be a good week for our preparation, we have had two high volume weeks which we have got over 70k from the boys which is an awful lot of load.
“The boys are now in the position to go and look at the counter press elements of the game.
“When you are short on numbers in training there is more action per minute and more intensity. The players are now ready for that so the aim is for the players to now be able to show off their tools.
“We play Reading on the back end of the trip which will be another really tough game but these are great, I much more enjoy playing against a Championship side and really feeling the heat by testing yourselves physically, tactically and mentally.”
The next opportunity for fans to see The Imps in action is when they take on Stoke City at Sincil Bank on Wednesday 24th July, tickets are available now at the Sincil Bank ticket office, or online via Eventbrite which you can find by clicking HERE
