Picture: Andrew Vaughan for Lincoln City FC
Lincoln City have signed midfielder, Alistair Smith on a free transfer after his release from Sutton United, the club revealed on this evening their official website.
Smith, a talented and promising midfielder, played a crucial role for Sutton United last season, contributing significantly to their mid-table finish in League Two. He emerged as one of the team’s key players, making a notable impact with five goals and three assists in 35 games. Despite facing injury setbacks, he displayed exceptional skill and determination, earning the well-deserved title of Young Player of the Season at Sutton. Smith’s return from a months-long injury absence played a pivotal role in rescuing the team’s season.
Smith’s professional journey began near to us, at local rivals Mansfield Town. While there, he gained valuable experience through loan spells at Loughborough Dynamo, Frickely, Altrincham, and Kettering. However, his career took a significant turn in the summer of 2021 when he made a permanent move to Sutton United. This transfer proved to be a defining moment in his career, as he established himself as a highly regarded midfielder at the League Two level. Over the course of two seasons, Smith showcased his scoring prowess by netting an impressive total of 14 goals, an impressive achievement for a player in his position.
We’ve been linked with Smith previously and it appears that Gillingham made a late push for the player yesterday, but we’ve got our man and he is now a Lincoln City player. He offers us a much needed dynamic midfielder, he is a real all-rounder in the centre of the park, and he looks a massive upgrade on Max Sanders, who was released a few weeks ago.
Upon his arrival, Alistair told the official club website, “I got a really good vibe after meeting people like Jez George, Mark Kennedy and everyone else at the club. I can tell its a really close-knit group from top to bottom and it’s somewhere that is the right place for me to progress.
“I’m here to work hard for the team, I’m always going to leave everything on the pitch, then I’m looking to show I’m capable of playing at this level. I’m here to help the team push on and have a successful season.”
Sutton fans seem gutted to lose him and that’s always a good sign. This is also a sign of very good recruitment, from the outside anyway. We aren’t paying a fee, but if we were it would be a decent one that would show ambition, so it’s clever. He’s come to the end of his contract at Sutton, and now he’s moving onto his next destination, which happens to be us. You could liken it Regan Poole’s situation with us, he’s not been released as such because Sutton would have kept him, but he has outgrown League Two and I can’t wait to see him make that step up with us.
What he will do is add goals, which is very important. I spoke about it when we were linked with him in another article, between Ethan Erhahon, Ted Bishop, Matty Virtue, Max Sanders and Lasse Sorensen they scored a combined five goals from midfield areas, Smith did that alone last year and scored nine the previous year in a midtable League Two side. It’s a good start to the summer, and hopefully we have some more over the next few weeks.