IT'S a clich to label the next game as the most important in a club's history.

Indeed, clich corner is crammed by exclaiming how any upcoming encounter is the most vital for any club, be it Arsenal down through to Zanzibar.

But for York City tonight's visit of Tamworth to Bootham Crescent has more than an ounce of the paramount about it.

The encounter is historic, that's for certain. It's the first ever league game outside of the Football League to be played at City's headquarters, the inaugural Conference collision at the Crescent.

And equally as incontestable is the fact that for the Minstermen the game already represents a potential turning-point even if it is only the second fixture of the 2004-05 season.

Saturday's opening Conference loss to Aldershot has piled the pressure on the new-look hosts having to finally banish a win-less sequence that stretches agonisingly all the way back to January 10 when they saw off Carlisle 2-0.

After that win City were in tenth place. But 20 games later - conquest never again sampled - City plummeted out of the Football League's basement and into the Conference, accompanied by none other than Carlisle, the last team they bested.

Not allowing for a pre-season in which they never bettered League opposition, though there was a steady improvement in each outing, their triumph-less misfortune now stands at 21 consecutive games.

Enter Tamworth tonight.

Now upwards of half of City's likely starting line-up against Tamworth were not even here during the ill-starred 2003-04 campaign which faded so fatally.

But arguably the people who most matter - manager Chris Brass, the now club-controlling board of directors, and City's hard-done-by fans - still survive that tortuous term. They, more than anyone, will be desperate to rid the club of more than seven months without relishing the thrilling taste of victory.

Battling boss Brass will not want to hike up the pressure on his still-gelling Minstermen by demanding outright victory. At least, not in public, that is. However, in private, this most competitive of leaders will be straining every cartilage, sinew, muscle and bone to bring about the lost art of winning, while exhorting all his charges' best endeavours to do the same.

The board, who initiated the boldest of old-guard removing transfers of power by installing Brass to the helm just over a season ago, will also be reluctant to heighten the burden on the player-manager. But they know too that hopes of increasing the fan-base through the turnstiles at the Crescent will hinge on genuine signs of a dramatic turnaround in form and results.

That brings us to the fans, those who have held the faith dearly and diligently when their patience has been tested to the utmost, not just by last season and the subsequent ache of relegation, but by previous campaigns which have been as appetising as a panda's diet. Shoots and leaves no less. Or in City's case, shoots and misses.

It's difficult to appeal for composure when for the last few years the fare dished up in front of the paying public would see a hyena turn up its nose.

But it's in the orbit of the City fans to ensure that they do not crank up the expectation to intolerable heights barely before a ball has been kicked. It is, after all, a new era, it is a new beginning. If City are not to return to their bad old ways then the supporters will have to be paragons of encouragement and equanimity.

Keep the faith - what more needs to be said.

Updated: 11:09 Tuesday, August 17, 2004