Gillingham face a Friday night trip to face fellow play-off hopefuls Notts County at the start of a run of games that could define the Club and Head Coach Stephen Clemence’s season. 

With home games against Stockport County and Wrexham to follow next week’s showdown with old foes Swindon Town and a trip to Newport thrown in for good measure, it’s a tough period ahead for Clemence and the Gills. 

With that in mind, we asked the Gills Head Coach this week if he’s achieved what he wanted to out of the January Transfer Window and he admitted, “I think we needed to freshen things up! The output at the top end of the pitch hasn’t been good enough, it hasn’t been good enough for a while at this Football Club.”

“We had to do what we have done with the strikers, and I also know that when I arrived at the Football Club, we were amongst the lowest crosses in the League, but we’re now the top since Christmas, Romeao (Hutton) has come in and helped with that and there’s obviously other players that have helped with that too.”

“The bits and pieces that we work on in training have been taken on board by the boys and there’s more balls coming into the box. So, if that service keeps coming in like it is, then I am quite sure that the players that we have now got in the building, more goals will start going in.” 

“We have not scored loads lately, but the chances have definitely been there, and we could have scored in the last number of games, two or three goals in probably all of them.”

“We did not play well in the last game (against Walsall), but we did not get beaten and actually we had the best chance to win it at the end! We “just” need those ones to start going in!” 

“The battling quality has been there most of the season from what I have seen. There have been some results, and I will only talk since I have been here, we have not really had a “doing!”

“There was only once in the technical area where I was a little bit worried that things could get a little bit messy and to be honest that came out of nowhere as it was actually in the Tranmere game where all of a sudden after we had been in control of the game, but didn’t create enough which was something I was trying to work, pretty much at the start of my reign here.”

“All of a sudden, we found ourselves a couple of goals down really quickly and it could have got worse as all the home fans were up, our lads looked like they were having a bit of a wobble, but they recovered in time!”

“Other than that, we have lost only by the odd goal, except for the Sheffield United game where we got done four, but that can happen against Premier teams.”

“The group’s battling qualities have always been there, and I know that whatever team goes out against Notts County on Friday night will stand up to be counted.”

“There will be things that we can improve on and look to get better at, that is what we are trying to do and that is probably more with the ball than without!” 

“The games we have had, I have been OK with the commitment levels that the boys show all the time. Sometimes where we let ourselves down is sometimes, we do not get our selection right with our pass or pick the wrong option.”

“It is difficult to change everything straight away, it takes time, especially at the moment in the winter in League Two where the pitches are not great either.”

“So sometimes we cannot play the pretty football that we like and have to sometimes be more direct which we have used lately! We have got to mix up our game which is what we are trying to do!” 

Clemence then confirmed that sadly Dom Jefferies’ injuries could see him sidelined for several weeks and maybe even to the end of the season. He is joined on the sidelines by striker Josh Andrews who isn’t quite ready to make his Gillingham debut.

Apart from that he takes a near full strength squad to Nottingham and he went onto confirm that the squad will be training on Sunday ahead of Tuesday’s visit of Swindon Town, and the Head Coach is only too well aware of the significance of the fixture to Gills fans. “I believe it means a lot to the supporters,” he admitted.

“I had to be honest before coming to Priestfield, I didn’t know a lot about the rivalry, but I’ve been told by my staff and people who work at the Club, so I’m expecting there to be a very good atmosphere on Tuesday night to get right behind the boys and let’s take them on as well.”