Boston United

Boston United's finest season began, oddly, with a defeat that hardly mattered. Between 1969 and 1970, under player-manager Jim Smith, the club went 51 league matches without losing — a run that still stands as a British professional football record. Smith later took charge at Blackburn Rovers and Newcastle United, but nothing on his CV matched what he built at York Street with a non-league side wearing amber and black.

The club traces its line back to 1933, formed as successor to the short-lived Boston Town — not to be confused with a separate Boston Town F.C. founded in 1964 by former United staff, which shares the name but no lineage. The nickname Pilgrims arrived later, adopted in 1969, a nod to the town's place in the story of the Pilgrim Fathers.

Promotion to the Football League finally came in 2001–02, when Steve Evans led the club to the Conference National title. It didn't last. Relegation from League Two in 2007 tipped the club into administration, and HM Revenue and Customs' involvement in the finances cost Boston United two divisions at a stroke — down to Conference North. A second administration followed in 2008, dropping the club further still, into the Northern Premier League Premier Division. The recovery took until 2010, when a play-off win started the climb back, and it continued in 2024 under Ian Culverhouse, whose side won the National League North play-off to return to the fifth tier.

In 2020 the Pilgrims left York Street after a dispute with the ground's owners and moved into the Boston Community Stadium, known also as the Jakemans Community Stadium, which holds 5,061. Paul Bastock stayed longer than the move — 679 appearances across 12 seasons before he went on to break the world record for professional appearances elsewhere. The FA Trophy final of 1985 remains the club's biggest day on a national stage, lost 2-1 to Wealdstone despite a goal from Chris Cook.

Boston United's local rivalry with Lincoln City carries the weight of a Lincolnshire derby, sharpened by the years the two clubs spent apart in the divisions and by how much a win over the bigger city club means back in Boston.