Phil Stant   

Phil Stant joined the Army from school and while still a teenager saw active service in the Falklands War. He was bought out of the Army in 1986 by Hereford United developing into a prolific scorer with a total of 32 goals in the 1988/89 season. This brought a £175,000 move to Third Division Notts County but he found goals harder to come by and was sent on loan to Blackpool in early September 1990 where he scored 5 goals in 12 games.

Under newly appointed manager Allan Clarke Lincoln City had made an increasingly poor start to the 1990/91 season and with main striker Tony Lormor injured in the third game of the season Clarke had brought in loan player Gary Powell from Everton to play alongside Paul Smith up front. But with Powell failing to find the net in 11 games his loan was not extended and he returned to Everton’s reserves. With Matt Carmichael out of favour, Keith Scott allowed to go on loan and Lormor struggling for fitness Clarke turned to another loan player, this time the 28-year-old Stant. “He is a very direct sort of player,” said Clarke, “he tends to be selfish in the box which most goalscorers are”. Stant’s first game was also Clarke’s last as a 3-0 home defeat by Darlington which left the Imps two points off the bottom of the league led to the appointment of club captain Steve Thompson as manager. Stant was left out of City’s two Leyland DAF Cup games to avoid being cup-tied but started in the next three league games. Substituted in the second half of all of them he then returned to Notts County at the end of his loan period.

Not the most distinguished period of Stant’s career, he then had a further loan spell at Huddersfield before joining Fulham, later resuming his record of prolific scoring with Mansfield, Cardiff and Bury. He had a total of 177 goals from 427 games at the age of 34 when Lincoln came calling again in December 1996. Under John Beck City’s season had been more positive than the previous one but had been dominated by a League Cup run which saw them lose in a Third Round replay to Premier League Southampton. In the league they had spent most of the season around mid-table and with main strikers Jae Martin and Gijsbert Bos only mustering four league goals between them it was clear what was needed.

Stant had made nine appearances for newly-promoted second tier side Bury earlier in the season scoring one goal before going on loan to Northampton where had appeared five times scoring twice. It seems highly unlikely that his spell with the Imps six years earlier had any bearing on his joining them now but John Beck would have been well aware of his record since then. Signed from Bury for a combined fee of £40,000 along with full back Stuart Bimson Stant scored on his debut in a defeat at Hull as he replaced Bos in the side. With Beck describing his performance as “a big plus” the striker’s arrival paid off immediately with goals in each of the next three league games including a brace in a 3-2 win against Doncaster that put City two points off a play-off place. A comparatively lean spell of three games followed with Stant missing a penalty in the third of these but he went on to register 11 goals in the last 15 games of the season including after another brief lean spell a run of eight in seven games.

With the Imps having just failed to scrape into a play-off place Stant’s goals dried up at the start of the 1997/98 season and he had just two to his name by the beginning of November. At the age of 35 he then lost his regular place in the side, appearing in just nine more games and scoring one goal as he began to take on more of a coaching role, assisting Shane Westley who had taken over from John Beck as the Imps won promotion to the third tier. The following season he made just five substitute appearances as he continued as assistant to Westley then to chairman John Reames who managed the side as City were relegated. Back in the basement division Stant made fairly regular appearances off the bench before being appointed manager in his own right for the start of the 2000/01 season. Boardroom changes then saw him succeeded by Alan Buckley at the beginning of March. He returned to playing with a brief spell at Brighton at the age of 38 followed by time with a string of non-league clubs including as player-manager at Gainsborough and Ilkeston.

Stant was an undoubted success following his permanent signing for the club and as well as being another player to feature in a promotion campaign also made it in at no. 51 in the 2007 poll of City’s League Legends.