Getting to know the Blue Square Premier : Forest Green

Forest Green Rovers are the Blue Square Premier's longest serving team and are often one of the first teams people discuss when the possibility of relegation is about. Winners of the "AGM Cup" a year ago, Forest Green had another year of struggle last season.

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Forest Green Rovers are a side I don't know a lot about, so much to the point where I am always unsure as to where roughly they are in the country (Nailsworth to be precise), but they are a club that have the distinctive honour of being the longest serving club in the top tier of non-league football having been there since 1998.

Formed in 1890 as Nailsworth and Forest Green, they have changed their name twice since then, to Stroud FC in 1989 and then to their current Forest Green Rovers name in 1992.

They have had a strange last few years that started as soon as they moved into their new stadium in 2006/7. The New Lawn holds 5,140 (2,500 seats) and the first game there was a friendly against Swindon Town. It's a stadium where the highest League attendance was 3,021 against Oxford United and red meat was even banned from the ground in February of this year.

As I mentioned, it's been a strange few years. The finished 7th in the Blue Square Premier thanks to a lot of goals from Stuart Fleetwood, but they have suffered their record defeat in that time, losing 7-0 to Cambridge United on September 5th 2009. It was at the start of a season in which Forest Green would finish in the bottom four but avoid relegation because of what has become known as the "AGM Cup". It's an end of season meeting that has seen a lot of clubs who finished in the bottom four surviving because of the misfortunes of others. Altrincham were particularly famous winners of the AGM Cup, surviving after finishing in the bottom four three seasons running.

There has however been some good news in recent years, they've made the FA Cup Third Round in both 2008/9 and 2009/10.

The Imps and Forest Green don't have many links with only Guy Ipoua, Matthew Ghent and Rob Betts playing for both during the last ten years, whereas Paul Wanless played for City in the 1990s and Forest Green in the middle of the last decade. Also, Anthony Tonkin rejected a contract after being on trial at Lincoln City, signing one at Forest Green.

Forest Green are one of the favourites for the drop according to most bookmakers.