Lincoln City's 65 year wait: what life back in the second tier means for the Imps

Lincoln City will play Championship (second-tier) football for the first time since 1961 when the new season starts on August 14. The step up follows a League One title win built on 103 points, and with the Championship odds already taking shape ahead of kick-off, few promoted sides have arrived with a title win quite like it.

A wait that stretched back generations

The Imps were relegated from the old Second Division in 1961, and the decades that followed were not kind. Lincoln City dropped as low as the National League before working their way back up the pyramid. A return to the second-tier means far more for a club with that history than it does for sides that have bounced between divisions more recently.

Sealing it at Reading

Promotion was confirmed with a 2-1 win at Reading on Easter Monday, a result that needed just a point to give them mathematically guaranteed promotion. Ryan One put Lincoln City ahead inside the opening five minutes, Reading levelled through Lewis Wing deep into stoppage time, and Jack Moylan settled it with a 96ᵗʰ minute winner. The result extended an unbeaten league run that had started the previous November.

Champions of League One

Automatic promotion had already been sealed, but the title itself was confirmed after a 2-0 win over Port Vale extended the unbeaten run to 29 matches. Moylan and Reeco Hackett finished as the club's leading league scorers with 11 goals apiece, and Lincoln City ended the season 12 points clear of second-placed Cardiff City. Michael Skubala picked up the League One Manager of the Year award for the campaign, recognition for turning a side that had finished 11ᵗʰ the previous season into champions inside a single year.

New voices in the dugout

Skubala, the head coach who oversaw the whole promotion campaign, left for Bristol City within a month of the title being won. Lincoln City responded by promoting from within, naming Chris Cohen and Tom Shaw as joint head coaches. Both had worked alongside Skubala throughout the season, and the club has been clear that continuity is the priority heading into the Championship.

Tougher opposition, bigger crowds

Lincoln City's average home league attendance during the title-winning season was 9,431, with a season high of 10,235 for the visit of Bolton Wanderers, and both figures should climb further against Championship opposition with larger travelling followings.

Wolverhampton Wanderers, Burnley and West Ham United have all come down from the Premier League this summer, meaning the Imps will face three sides with recent top-flight experience inside their first season back. Cardiff City and Bolton Wanderers have also arrived from League One, though neither spent as long away from the second tier as Lincoln City did.

The division itself is changing too. The 2026-27 campaign is the first in which the Championship play-offs expand from four teams to six, widening the route back to the Premier League for whoever misses out on an automatic place.

Fans keeping an eye on the football odds for the season ahead will want to see how the market treats a side with less top-flight pedigree than most of the league, despite already proving they can win a division at a canter.