Nine Years in Paradise: The Story Of Lincoln City’s Rise To The Championship 2017-2026
From purgatory to paradise. From the National League to the Championship.
When Danny Cowley led Lincoln City out of the National League in 2017, few imagined that the Imps’ return to the Football League was merely the prologue to something far greater. Nine years on, a club that began the 2025-26 season with one of the smallest budgets in League One finished it as champions – promoted to English football’s second tier for the first time since 1961.
Nine Years in Paradise is the story of that improbable ascent. Taking up the tale where Six Years in Purgatory left off, it charts every step of Lincoln’s climb through the divisions: the early silverware under the Cowleys, the boardroom revolution led by Clive Nates, the leftfield appointment of head coach Michael Skubala, and a culture of innovation, data and intelligent recruitment that left wealthier rivals trailing in its wake. It builds to an historic Easter Monday at Reading, where Jack Moylan’s 96th-minute winner sealed the dream.
As with Six Years in Purgatory, this is a comprehensive record of nine remarkable seasons. Every league and cup game is detailed, alongside transfers, tales from the boardroom and the off-field strategy that redefined how a football club could flourish. Every player to wear the shirt is profiled, each manager assessed, and a wealth of statistics compiled – the definitive account of how a club that almost went to the wall in 2015 kept changing the game until it found one it could win.
For the Sincil Bank faithful who endured six years of purgatory, paradise has finally arrived.
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By Philip Priddle | Publication date: 17 July 2026 | print format only | £29.99 paperback | 412 pages | ISBN: 9781918612066