Gillingham boss Martin Allen wants his side to extend their lead at the top of League Two when Rochdale come to Priestfield on Saturday.

Allen’s side have had a superb start to the season with seven wins out of their first eight games and remain unbeaten leaving them six points clear at the top of the league.

After such an emphatic start to the season, Allen has challenged his squad to maintain their unbeaten run, but crucially build a healthy lead on their rivals in League Two:

“The challenge for everybody now is to try and stay there and increase that six point gap, get further away, get as many wins as we can and everybody within the group realises that.”

“There is still more to come without a shadow of a doubt. There have been some good performances but we haven’t hit top form at home yet. Southend was good but from an attacking perspective – moving the ball around the pitch, creating chances, getting our full backs forward and playing more football there is more to come.”

Meanwhile, Gillingham fans can once again expect to see changes to the side that beat Port Vale last weekend with Allen promising to adopt his rotation policy once more:

“I don’t see them as changes – they are all just players, no one has been dropped. I just rest people and bring somebody in and I think that makes us stronger because the ones that come in want to come in and do well.”

“They are fresher and some of them might have a point to prove but we won away last week at Port Vale – that was 1st versus 2nd and was billed as a massive game. I didn’t see it that way, I just thought it was another game and we will make a load more changes this Saturday – that’s how it is.”

“Every game that we play is going to be tough; people will come here with a bit extra to try and beat us. At any level of football it’s exactly the same, you have to be right on your game and the challenge for the players, and for myself, is to make sure we do everything we can in our preparation and mind set to make sure we are concentrated and do our jobs properly.

“If we do that, play well and go about it in the right way mentally, that will take care of ourselves physically, and then tactically and technically we are on top of where we need to be and we can then deal with the opposition.