Forest Green Rovers v Bristol Rovers
Pre-season, The New Lawn Stadium, Tuesday 21 July 2026, 7pm KO
Bristol Rovers will continue their preparations for the 2026/27 Sky Bet League Two season when they make the short trip to Forest Green Rovers.
The Pirates are coming off the back of two outings at The Mem, with a tough test against former Premier League champions Leicester City before facing Sky Bet Championship side Portsmouth on Saturday.
Rovers more than matched their opponents and gained the lead in the second half through Fabrizio Cavegn, who found the bottom corner with a fine finish from the edge of the box before Brandon Downey levelled for Pompey.
As for National League outfit Forest Green, they have played two pre-season fixtures so far, beating Bishops Cleeve and Merthyr Town.
Read everything you need to know about the fixture below...
Tickets…
Tickets for our fixture against Forest Green are available here!
Travel…
From Bristol by car, drive north on the M32 and join the M4 westbound for a short distance before leaving at Junction 18 to join the A46 towards Stroud. Stay on the A46, passing through Chipping Sodbury and Nailsworth, then as you approach Nailsworth follow local signs for The New Lawn by turning onto Spring Hill and continuing up the hill to the stadium.
Opposition…
Forest Green have spent the previous two seasons in the National League after falling out of the EFL in the 2023/24 campaign, finishing bottom of Sky Bet League Two.
They have twice gone close to returning to the fourth tier, but have suffered play-off heartbreak. The Green Devils finished 3rd in the 2024/25 season, losing to Southend United on penalties in the semi-final.
Robbie Savage came in to lead Forest Green in the summer and led them to nine wins in their first 11 fixtures, but after a difficult middle period of the campaign, they dropped to seventh. It meant they had to start in the quarter-finals of the play-offs, where they lost to Boreham Wood.
They have been busy in the transfer window, with plenty of players departing. In terms of incomings, they have brought in Ethan Ross, Emeka Obi and Oliver Ewing from fellow National League teams Altrincham, Kidderminster and Scunthorpe United, respectively.
In addition to adding some National League South talent to their ranks, Savage has brought in James Berry on loan from Wycombe Wanderers and Sydney Agina from Stoke City.
Previous Meetings…
Written by Keith Brookman...
Rovers travel to face Forest Green on Tuesday evening in a pre-season friendly; over the years, Rovers have quite often made the short trip to Nailsworth, going back to before they moved to the current home at the New Lawn in 2006.
Their old ground, also known as The Lawn, was situated just a few hundred yards down the hill from where they now play.
There have been only eight competitive games between the sides, four of which came in The Conference (now National League) in 2014/15.
The first of those games came at The New Lawn on Bank Holiday Monday, 25th August 2014. Rovers earned themselves a point from a 1-1 draw. Andy Monkhouse scored after 56 minutes, but his strike was cancelled out by Jon Parkin’s equaliser just 12 minutes later. The crowd of 3,781 was a ground record at the time.
The return fixture in October saw the Gloucestershire Rovers win 1-0 courtesy of a 16th-minute goal by their skipper and former Rovers player, Danny Coles. Rovers ended the game with ten men following Danny Leadbitter’s second-half red card for a challenge on Kurtis Guthrie.
The sides also met twice more in the Conference playoff semi-final. On Wednesday 29th April, in the First Leg, Matty Taylor’s 17th-minute goal was enough to give Rovers a slender lead to take into the Second Leg. Ellis Harrison picked up two yellow cards and a subsequent red, meaning he was suspended for the Second Leg.
Rovers recorded a comfortable 2-0 win in that Second Leg on 3rd May, with goals from Chris Lines and Matty Taylor, thus securing a passage to the Wembley Play Off Final to face Grimsby Town.
Rovers, who returned from a training camp in Portugal in the early hours of Saturday 22nd July 2017, fulfilled their commitment to play a friendly at The New Lawn that same afternoon but slipped to a 2-0 defeat and hardly got out of first gear as their travels took their toll. Liam Noble and Shamir Mullings scored the goals for the home side in front of a crowd of 1,566.
Competitive fixtures resumed in 2021/22 with FGR beating us 2-0 at The New Lawn on 27th November 2021, and the point they gained from a goalless draw in the return fixture at The Mem in April 2022 was enough to seal their promotion to League One. They finished the season as League Two Champions, and we followed them into the league above by virtue of finishing in third place.
It was in League One the following season that the clubs last met, with Forest Green winning 2-1 at The Mem on 20th July 2022 and Rovers winning the return fixture 3-1 at the New Lawn on 11th March 2023.
Charlie Savage, son of current FGR boss Robbie, gave the home side the lead, but John Marquis (2) and Scott Sinclair scored for Rovers, and James Belshaw saved an 85th-minute penalty. The home side were relegated at the end of that season and again at the end of the 2024/25 campaign when they found themselves back in the National League.
