Chris Cohen believes that a Lincoln City trip to Bournemouth is a fitting reward for their Carabao Cup victory at Blackpool, despite the Imps once again being handed an away tie.
City secured their place in the third round with an impressive 3-1 win at Bloomfield Road. A much-changed side delivered the result, earning the opportunity to test themselves against established Premier League opposition in the next stage of the competition.
A home draw would naturally have been welcomed after successive away assignments, but Cohen’s attention is firmly fixed on the size of the opportunity awaiting his players. Bournemouth will present a significant step up, but the joint head coach views the fixture as one to embrace rather than fear.
“It’s incredible,” he told Michael Hortin on Red Imps Club. “You look at a team like Bournemouth 10 or 15 years ago and the journey that they’ve been on, and you look at a team like Lincoln 10 or 15 years ago and the journey, there are a lot of similarities in our story and their story.”
Those parallels give the tie an additional point of interest. Both clubs have climbed a considerable distance during that period, although Bournemouth are now firmly established at the highest level of English football.
The game represents a reward, of sorts, for the work done at Blackpool. The Imps made 11 changes for the second-round tie but still produced a strong performance and a convincing result. Sadly, for the 16th time in 21 draws, City have been given an away tie.
In fact, if you want to recall a League Cup win at Sincil Bank for the Imps, you have to go back to 2004/05, when we beat Crewe Alexandra 5-1. That’s more than two decades of either defeats or away draws, not that Chris is too bothered.
“We know it’ll be a very, very tough game,” he added. “Every player wants to test themselves and every coach wants to test themselves against the best in the world. Bournemouth are a standout Premier League team now, and we can’t wait to go down there and hopefully give the fans another good evening in the cup.”
The challenge will be significant for City, but there are some interesting parallels. Very few players switch between the two clubs, given the distance, but having beaten them at their place in 2008 in the basement division, it will give both sides a chance to reflect on how far they’ve moved up.
there was the famous 9-0 to recall. I was working down in that area that weekend so lapped it up