Lancaster City to face Bury AFC in FA Cup

Lancaster City will face Bury AFC at the Giant Axe on Saturday in the hope of reaching the FA Cup Third Qualifying Round.

The Dollies’ first qualifying round tie against Stalybridge Celtic went to a replay, which they won 1-0 in extra time.

Given their very busy schedule in the coming weeks, Mark Fell’s men will be hoping that they won’t have to do the same again and that the winner will be known by full time on Saturday.

Bury AFC got their FA Cup run under way on September 3 with a 2-1 home win over North Shields.

The Shakers’ North West Counties Football League form has been solid, winning five and losing two of the seven games they’ve played, sitting in seventh place but with a game or three in hand over some of the teams above them.

As a phoenix club of Bury FC, who were an English Football League side before their expulsion from League One in 2019, Bury AFC are one of the most well-supported teams at their level of the non-league pyramid, consistently supported by crowds of around 1,000 at their home games.

Bury FC have been bought out of administration recently and proposals to merge the two clubs are causing division amongst the fan bases.

As for City in the Northern Premier League Premier Division, they have won one, drawn four and lost two and are struggling for consistency.

That, however, may be down to the fact that they are currently in a rather difficult situation regarding injuries, with nine members of the 21man first team squad out as of Tuesday evening.

Mark Fell said to the club website: "I don’t think we’ll have any of them back for Saturday”.

He revealed on Tuesday that he’d given his players a full week off from training last week to try not to risk any more injuries and admitted that not training had made them look “sluggish” at times in their defeat to South Shields that night.

He was unsure as to whether there would be enough fit players to make up the 18-man squad, saying: “I’m genuinely not sure that we can put 13 fit bodies into that squad”.

Having said that, Fell still wants to “be positive” and, with progression in this competition coming with highly-beneficial cash rewards to clubs, “it would help us massively” if his side could stay in the FA Cup.

With a two-tier gap between Lancaster City and Bury AFC in the home team’s favour, they could do just that.

The game kicks off at 3pm on Saturday at the Giant Axe.