History

What else can we say about this evening’s news? History has been made, pure and simple. Never before in the entire life of Lincoln City Football Club has such a double transfer swoop been made. Believe me there are 23 teams in League Two looking at their social media feeds tonight wondering what exactly is happening at Lincoln City.

I’ll come to Harry in a bit, his move to City alone is a coup for the club. I can’t go a minute longer without typing the following sentence:  Michael Bostwick has signed for Lincoln City.

His name might not be ‘household’, he may not be a Premier League player dropping four divisions, but bringing him to the club is the single most audacious coup I have ever known us to pull off. He is a versatile midfield player, comfortable in front of the back four or indeed as part of it. He can sit in at right back, he can even fill in at centre back. He’s tough tackling with one setting: intense.

He made his name at Stevenage, helping them to the Conference title in 2010 as well as the FA Trophy the season before. After two seasons with them in League Two he fell onto the radar of Darren Ferguson at Posh, and was eventually signed for an ‘undisclosed’ fee rumoured to be £250k.

He mad 39 appearances for them in the Championship and has been virtually ever present over his five seasons at London Road. He’s won the hearts of the fans, even this season he was voted their away Player of the Year. He is an established, top-half League One player at worst. I say at worst because when he was transfer listed this summer it alerted a host of clubs. Blackburn were rumoured to be interested, Leeds were rumoured to be interested and Coventry were ruled out by observers for being in League Two.

I’m told the negotiations took well over four hours last night, and although the players have been down at the ground all day, the finer points clearly took some time as well. Just because a player is on the transfer list doesn’t mean it is an easy discussion to have, and Barry Fry is better at playing hard ball than anyone else involved in football today. He is the Del Boy of the Football League, a man whom we often love to hate, but today with must begrudgingly respect him for letting these boys move to Lincoln City.

Why was Bostwick transfer listed by Posh? Barry Fry and co have a policy that any player turning down a new deal going into the final year of his contract is put on the list. Maybe it is to keep the club harmony, maybe it is to satisfy Barry’s lust for swapping personnel like kids swap stickers in the playground. Whatever it is, Bostwick was made available and a lot of clubs started to weigh up a move for him. Lincoln City was as likely destination for him as Barcelona, he looked almost certain to return to the Championship, or a recently relegated side at the very worst.

That poses the question, how the hell has he ended up holding aloft a Lincoln City shirt this evening? How has a 29-year old midfielder arguably in his prime ended up at our club, ‘little’ old Lincoln. Maybe it’s because we’re not ‘little’ old Lincoln anymore. Maybe, just maybe it is because he sees from the outside things we dare not see here. If anything screams ‘this club is going places’, it is signing a midfielder far too good for your level. He doesn’t even come with a ‘Billy Knott’ style point to prove either, he’s established and proven. He hasn’t suffered major injuries, he hasn’t had a dip in form, at first glance there is literally nothing at all to suggest he is here for any reason other than our ambition.

Let us not skirt around the elephant in the room either, money. Michael Bostwick will not have come cheap, not in terms of wages nor that undisclosed fee. I wouldn’t mind a bet that we broke our record transfer fee paid this evening, and we’ll not have a chance to celebrate it. Danny wouldn’t want one player to be on a pedestal over the rest of his lads, and rightly so. Hopefully this is the first and last mention we’ll have of the fee, because once we’ve all picked ourselves up off the floor, refreshed our browser in case it was an error, checked the calendar to make sure it is April 1st, then we just move on with Michael Bostwick as another member of our squad. Our bloody good squad.

Matt Green was our marquee signing, leading scorer for a team at our new level last season and coveted by teams in League One and Two. Where does that leave Michael Bostwick? Combined with Harry Anderson we’ve got enough marquees in our side to host our own festival. At this rate we’re going to need more land.

That brings me succinctly on to Harry Anderson, a player whose arrival might get swamped in all of the Michael Bostwick disbelief. I have said all pre-season that if we sign Harry Anderson then we mean business, and now I’m talking about his arrival in tenth paragraph of the blog. Signing Harry Anderson is another coup, and one that will probably be understated over the next 48 hours. The fact he’s put his name at the bottom of a three-year deal shows as much about our management team’s intent as it does the player. He’s here to stay, they’re here to stay.

I rate this kid as highly as any of the players he is joining, potentially as highly as Alex Woodyard and Sean Raggett. He oozes class, he has all the attributes needed to be a really special player. I said it earlier, he’s direct and powerful but dangerous around the box too. He pushed us through a tough spell last season early doors, and then he returned to give us the extra legs as the season died away. He’s a ‘Cowley’ boy, just like Woodyard and Billy Knott. They know him, they trust him and he feels the same. I’d imagine he could have moved elsewhere too, but he trusts our management team to handle his development correctly.

I wondered exactly how Danny could add value to the squad this summer after the other arrivals. We had a squad of 13 or 14 players that can do a job in League Two, but I wondered how he could bring players in to add value without making them promises about first team games he couldn’t keep. How could Danny have justified bringing in James Rowe for instance, knowing he didn’t stand a chance of displacing Alex Woodyard? I wasn’t worried as such, but I was apprehensive that the rest of the summer dealings may have seemed like filler, players coming in as back up. We are used to it at City are we not? For every Simon Yeo there was a Rory May, for every Scott Kerr, an Omari Coleman. I just can’t see the filler this summer, all I can see are players who are League One quality at least.

I started this blog with the title history, and I truly feel tonight’s announcement really is historic for Lincoln City. I’ve been a fan for over 30 years, and in all of those pre-seasons we’ve made good signings and bad. Now I do know that these players all have to go out and perform, and names alone do not win you games. I know this, but in Anderson, Knott and Ginnelly we know they can perform in City shirts. In Bostwick and Matt Green we know we have proven players from elsewhere. In Ollie Palmer and Jordan Maguire-Drew we know we have players who threaten great things, and players who have potential that can be reached and breached with the right management.

Anderson, Ginnelly, Knott, Maguire-Drew, Palmer, Green and Bostwick. That, Peter Jackson, really is a Magnificent Seven, and I don’t think Danny is done yet.

If you weren’t excited about the coming season already, then the time to start being overly optimistic is upon us. Nobody else will say it, nobody wants to heap pressure on the players, but when I look at our carefully crafted squad, the spine from last season’s historic win and the new faces with so much experience and talent, I can’t help but think we might go through League Two like a dodgy chicken korma.