Sam Tillen was happy with the fight shown by his players to recover from an early two-goal deficit ensuring parity was restored against Lincoln United
A first half penalty save from Jamie Pardington as well as second half goal from Gbolahan Okewoye and a late equaliser from Will Cowin helped the Imps start their 2025/26 pre-season campaign with a 2-2 draw at the Sun-Hat Villas and Resorts Stadium.
Tillen said: “After the second goal we showed a real resilience and a real depth of character which is fantastic and that bore out at the end of the game.
“We had a few older lads in the group but from a youth team perspective we had three days going into this after reconvening on Tuesday so for them to put out the output they did, everybody played their part and we ended up with a very young side out on the pitch and that was the group that managed to get us a couple of goals.”
Tillen believes his side learned valuable lessons throughout the game which included the physicality of playing against a men's senior side.
He added: “You’ve got to make sure you’re very conscientious when it comes to set pieces in particular when you’re lacking a bit of physicality - we learned from that and got a lot closer to people and I think that was a fantastic baptism of fire.”