24 February 2024 , 07:00
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Given Lincoln City are one of the Football League's more enterprising clubs, it should come as no surprise to see them breaking new ground this week.
The Imps have been on an upward trajectory since returning to the EFL in 2017 and are currently plotting a route to elevate themselves beyond their current League One status. Crucially, their ascent on the pitch has been matched by their diligent work off it.
Lincoln are a club which strives to do things the right way and have now become just the third team in England to implement the golden share: a veto which gives supporters the power to dismiss changes to elements of the club's heritage which have been deemed sacrosanct such as location, team colours and the team badge.
On these shores, only Brentford and Stevenage have committed to implementing the share, which was voted in by shareholders and will be given to the Red Imps Community Trust.
And while that may seem like a paltry return given the current scrutiny on governance in football, chief executive Liam Scully isn't one to rub Lincoln's ability to follow such a model in the face of others who have neither the scope nor the stability to do so.
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Scully has worked in sport since leaving school at the age of 16 and is a highly-polished practitioner who has been at the forefront of Lincoln's operations since 2017. Together, he and the board's aim is for their collective voice to be trusted. Implementing measures like the golden share go a long way to achieving that goal.
"We're incredibly proud to be within a small group of clubs that have done this," he explains to Mirror Football shortly after the golden share's implementation. "We want to be seen as a club that do things, you know, quote-unquote, in the right way, but what we're also not saying this is how it has to be done.
"Every football club is different. There are 72 football clubs in the EFL and most of them are well-run, even if I appreciate the narrative isn't always like that. What we're very cognizant of is that just because something is right for Lincoln City, that doesn't necessarily mean it's right for others."
Lincoln City have made significant progress on and off the pitch (Chris Vaughan/CameraSport)As a legacy of previous hardships, such as the calamitous collapse of the ITV Digital broadcasting deal, the club have two fans situated on the board of directors. Scully and the club's leadership group have, in their own words, sought a way to "make those roles redundant", in the nicest way possible.
He adds: "We are only the temporary custodians of this Football Club: that might be for 10 years, 20 years, who knows? But whatever it is, it will be a mere dot in the 140-year history of the club. Our job is to leave the Football Club in a better place than when we found it."
Encouragingly, Lincoln recognised that the club were already implementing plenty of the recommendations that were put forward from the government's White Paper report. However, the notion of the golden share presented them with something they could push further.
Formalising the right to veto certain decisions was, as Scully puts it, a no-brainer to give to fans - even if there is seemingly no apparent need for such measures at Sincil Bank.
"This is seen as a benefit but people are typically most agitated in this area when there is a need and there is a reason for this. Hopefully with this group [the right to veto] is something that will never be needed. But it's ensuring that there is something that protects legacy items and the club and its heritage for the next 140 years and beyond."
Michael Skubala was appointed as the Imps' head coach back in November (Chris Vaughan/CameraSport)Scully and the club's ownership group may be engrossed with safeguarding the club for future generations, but there's no neglecting the present. Lincoln are an enterprising football club who have engineered their own strategy to progress. Unsurprisingly given previous hardships, ustainability is at the heart of said strategy.
The Win-Develop philosophy that the club have implemented focuses on identifying players pre-peak. Then it's a simple equation: they either grow with the Imps and advance through the leagues or, if their ascent accelerates beyond that of the club, they are sold on for profit.
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In recent years, Lincoln's talent identification has seen them acquire - albeit only temporarily - players who now ply their trade in the Premier League. The elevation that the likes of Brennan Johnson, Harry Toffolo and Morgan Rodgers have experienced following their time at the club now serve as inspiration for the next generation, such as Freddie Draper and Sean Roughan. Crucially, they are homegrown players who belong to Lincoln.
"Our investors have supported us in terms of our growth strategy, but that level of investment and support isn't for forever," Scully continues. "We need redistribution and reform to play its part in the game. But then equally, we've then got to understand how we bridge that gap.
"When you look at the current financial model in the EFL, the large majority of teams are still needing that over-invested support in order to meet their liabilities. That's where we want to shift the dial.
"If you look at the constitution of League One in the last few years, you'll see your Sunderland's, your Ipswich's, Sheffield Wednesday's, Derby's, and Portsmouth's. And quite frankly, there will always be entities like that who we can't compete against.
"For us it's about bringing in people in to add value [to the club] and to develop them. We've now got a track record with that. We can talk about players, like Brennan, Harry and Morgan, but it's the same for the off-field team as well.
"We have some very notable colleagues or former colleagues now that have gone on to bigger and quite frankly better things than Lincoln City and we're so proud of them. They are our best advert when we go and recruit that next era. They become our biggest sales pitch when we talk to people.
"It's a philosophy which is about so much more than just the sporting side; it's a golden thread that runs throughout the whole football club."
The appointment of Michael Skubala, formerly of Leeds United and the England futsal team, is further evidence of the club's long-term strategy. He boasts over 20 years of experience and his pedigree when it comes to player development was one of the driving factors behind his appointment.
It's accepted that the club will need to overachieve in the division if they are to reach their goal of Championship football. In Skubala, Lincoln are confident they have found somebody with the necessary attributes to make that vision a reality.
Lincoln have aspirations of becoming a sustainable Championship club (Andrew Vaughan/CameraSport)"What we see in Michael and his methodology is the ability to pick, select and develop a team that's very, very competitive and can ultimately overachieve in the division.
"In Michael, Tom Shaw and Chris Cohen, we boast an excellent coaching team; they are outstanding practitioners at what they do and they will be a huge part of our success long into the future."
Away from football, Lincoln are using their influence to drive change in the community. The club ranked fifth in the 2023 Fan Engagement Index out of 72 clubs and there are plans to do even more with the opening of the new Stacey West community hub.
The hub, which is due to open before the end of the season, will be "the centrepiece" of Lincoln's extensive community work. The club have started providing free English lessons for local people to support the migrant population in Lincoln as well as extra-time hubs and cancer care programmes.
Scully adds: "Let's be really clear: when we talk about Win-Develop, ultimately, we have to win. We completely understand that all of this doesn't have the kryptonite that makes it special if there's not something to get behind.
"But our owners and investors have invested into something that's about so much more than just what happens at three o'clock on a Saturday afternoon. Football clubs can effectively provide local solutions to local problems, right up and down the country, using their badge and their reach. So many clubs do that well. In Lincoln, we're no different. We're proud of that."
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