Gillingham v Swindon Town; it is a fixture that always gets the blood pumping especially in Gills fans and produces a unique atmosphere, one which manager Mark Bonner will experience for the first time this weekend in Wiltshire, and the Gills boss cannot wait. 

“I have been made aware of the rivalry” Bonner told KSN this week, “But the most important thing is the competitive rivalry on the pitch between us and an opponent is that we want to win the game like any other, and when that win means a little bit more to supporters, it does give you extra even incentive if that is possible, to try and give them a performance as well.  

“But in the end, we want to do that because where we are and the fact that they are desperate to see us do well. When you are in a bad run of results, you are desperate to turn that around, so that is what we will be really focused on trying to deliver that as best we can.” 

“When we went ahead against Accrington, we were top in that moment, yet within a couple of games you are eleventh and that sums the League up.  

“It says that anyone can beat anyone and we can beat anyone but anyone can beat us. It also says that a run of consecutive bad results means that you can drop places quite quickly but the reverse is also true and you know with a couple of good results you can get back up there.  

“When we were in a really good position in the League, I wasn’t a genius and we weren’t a complete team, and now that we have slipped to eleventh and on a run of defeats, I am not hopeless and neither is the team, so the truth is somewhere in the middle,” the Gills boss said defiantly before continuing.  

“Our process is get through it; end the run as quick as possible because it’s gone on way longer than it needed to and should have done, but all we can do is play that next game and try to be as close to your best level as possible.

“And we have to hang on to the teams who are in the positions that we want to be in whilst we get the team stronger and everything else and not feel sorry for ourselves, but there is no way we can be a streaky team you can’t be a team that in the first month of the season manager of the month, which basically means that the team have been really successful. 

“Nominated for manager of the month in month two which means you have had a really good month, and then monster of the month in the third and has to leave the Club because the team in hopeless all of a sudden, none of those are true and the run of results are stupid. We have to find some middle ground and work out getting a positive result and building from there.”  

“Our big focus has to be that we are at our highest level to put ourselves in a position to win the game and most importantly to end the run of results that we are on, and really importantly to give the supporters that are travelling in such big numbers a good day out because not only do they deserve it, they also are desperate for it as much as we are given our recent results.  

“Thats the beauty of quick turn arounds in busy periods in our sport when you are in a run like we are in that the next game comes round pretty fast which is important in the fact that you don’t spend too much time talking about the last one as you have to shift your focus pretty sharply to the next one. Thats where we are, that’s where we were on Thursday and hopefully, we can get ourselves ready for a real good level game at the weekend.” 

The manager then went through his squad for the weekend; Max Clark is suspended after picking up five yellow cards whilst the manager was hopeful that George Lapslie would play a part despite coming off during Tuesday’s defeat to Newport County. Armani Little is close to a return and Glenn Morris is back in training although Saturday may be too early for both players, the manager conceded.