Lincoln City gained the upper hand on their former manager Michael Skubala as they beat his Bristol City side at Ashton Gate.

Skubala left the Imps in May, just over four weeks after guiding them to the League One title and promotion to the Championship, and the Lincoln starting XI included nine players who featured under him last season.

Among those was Freddie Draper, who capitalised on a defensive mishap from the Robins early in the second half to score the only goal of the match.

The result sees Lincoln leapfrog Bristol City in the table, up to eighth, as they extended their unbeaten league run to five consecutive games.

This was the first league meeting between the two clubs since April 1986, and while Bristol City enjoyed double the possession and twice as many shots, they lacked quality in front of goal and faced a solid Lincoln defence.

Their best pressure came during the first 20 minutes of the first half, when Rio Cardines curled multiple set pieces into the box that his teammates were unable to finish from.

Imps keeper George Wickens tapped a Hirakawa effort over, Lorent Tolaj headed onto the crossbar, and Gibson Yah headed wide from a few yards out, before Tolaj missed the best chance of the half when the ball was recycled out to him unmarked in the box and he missed the target.

Lincoln were limited to just one real effort, as Chiedoziwe Ogbene dived onto a Dom Jefferies cross and put the ball the wrong side of the post.

The visitors started brighter after the break and Ogbene broke onto a pass from Draper into space and forced keeper Sam Tickle into a save.

Shortly afterwards they took the lead, pouncing on a defensive howler as Ben House got his boot on a sloppy Rob Dickie backpass to Tickle, who had come off his line.

House tapped the ball on to Draper, and he had an empty net to slot into for his second goal in two games.

Hirakawa had an opportunity to draw the hosts level seven minutes later, only for Wickens to react quickly to deny him, and Bristol City's misery was compounded when centre-back Dickie was stretchered off with a serious-looking knee injury.

Lisav Eissat headed wide and Dom Ballard also struck wide from the edge of the box in the closing minutes as Lincoln recorded a fourth Championship clean sheet of the campaign.

Bristol City manager Michael Skubala told BBC Radio Bristol:

"I don't think we did enough. We had enough of the ball but this team [Lincoln], I know them well, they're not too interested about the ball. They defend solid, they don't give up chances easily, and in the end we gave up a sloppy chance.

"That's not good enough from us. It's too sloppy. You've got to respect the level more, the game more, and we didn't need to take those risks there, and they pounced on it. I can't remember another chance they really created.

"We didn't do enough to put them to the sword when we did have the ball. The first half we were on top, the second half after the goal we huffed and puffed without any real quality.

"It's both boxes that hurt us again. The middle of the pitch we can control the game, get hold of the ball, and move the ball a bit too slow at times, but it just feels like we're conceding too easy and we're not scoring enough."

Lincoln City joint head coach Chris Cohen told BBC Radio Lincolnshire:

"We're incredibly proud of the group of players. We love working with them.

"We love being part of it and we just keep - at the moment - giving these fans these amazing memories, which is what it's all about.

"These away games at big stadiums, where Lincoln City, maybe from the outside looking in shouldn't be winning, me and Tom [Shaw, co-head coach] are so happy to be a part of it.

"Every player works so hard every day. We have to drag them off the training ground - I've never seen it to the extreme that it is now of how together they are as a unit, and it gives you a chance.

"We could have drawn that game, we could have lost that game. George makes a brilliant save at 1-0 and maybe it's a different game, but I know we're going to give ourselves a chance from pure personality, heart and passion."