Bath City's Twerton Park

Bath City's Twerton Park was one of the most old school grounds that the Imps have visited since their return to the Conference.

If there's one thing you learn regarding being a Lincoln fan, it's that were invariably lose to teams that are bottom of the league, so it was surprising that as many Lincoln fans turned out for the game against Bath as they did given the host's record. Infact, it was almost inevitable that City would lose.

Combine that with the fact I wasn't in the mood for football, I'm surprised even I had made this trip. I had had a rough few days before hand and was going through a few personal issues, and even right up until the point that the coach went out of Lincoln I was tempted just to get off and go. I really wasn't in the mood for football at all.

The long trip to Somerset and the city of Bath was a relatively easy one to be honest, long but relatively easy due to the fact you just keep on following the A46. Although it may not seem like it, that road starts in Bath and ends in Cleethorpes, going around Lincoln on it's way. This makes the trip relatively easy to do as you just keep following the signs, so even when you're forced to go onto other roads that have caused the fragmentation, you just look for where it says A46 and you're sorted. In theory you could go all the way without the need for a sat-nav....in theory.

Once in the city it seems like a relatively simple journey to the ground and there are a few minor things to do right next to the ground, although don't get your hopes up with regards to being able to kill entire days in the area.

The car park at the ground is relatively small and there are very few signs once you get off of your coach that direct you to the away end, so it's a case of just follow the crowd.

Once inside the ground you get a choice between either a seated away end or a terrace, the latter of which wouldn't look out of place in the 1970s. It is a real throwback to videos from that decade and stretches all the way behind the goal. There are also houses that look into the ground and there were several people watching the game from these houses, and when Bath scored they joined in the celebrations.

The seated away end is about 20/30 yards in length and forms part of a two stand effort on the side of the pitch. This stand doesn't offer an overly good view of the other end of the pitch, and the supporting pillars do make finding a seat that easily allows a view of the goal next to the terrace a bit tricky.

Next to the away seats are home seats that are in an elevated stand, not too dissimilar to the main stand at Cheltentham.

Opposite the seated stands is a pitch length terrace of a fairly decent height. This stand wasn't very popular with the Bath fans and was largely unoccupied. It was covere all the way along and again had houses behind it that allowed the view of the match.

The final stand behind the far goal appeared to be a perfectly flat area that was effectively a go between for the terrace and seated stands, although I could be wrong and there could be steps that, but it's hard to tell from the away end due to the lack of decent height of either version of the away end.

I'm not sure whether it's just because they don't normally have an atmosphere or whether it's because by then they were effectively down, but the atmosphere from Bath fans was pretty much non-existent. Even when they scored (both of their goals came in the first three minutes of the game), there was barely a noise. I suspect it will be a lot different if we ever play them again and they aren't consigned to the drop.

Bath fans seemed friendly enough, there were no signs of antagonism from them whatsoever and the occasional conversation that I had with some of them showed that they know their stuff.

Overall, I did quite liked the visit to Bath City, although had I been on the train or drove I would have left after the aforementioned first three minutes. I wouldn't mind visiting Twerton Park again, but I don't think I would do it unless the Imps were playing or I was living in the area.