A sold out and maximum home support will be backing Gillingham this weekend as they face everything that is associated with Wrexham at Priestfield and Stephen Clemence can’t wait.

Clemence has been talking about the weekend in his weekly briefing and told KSN that he and his squad are in no doubt what to expect come 3.00pm Saturday afternoon… 

“There will be a big crowd and obviously there is an interest with everything that has gone on at Wrexham over the past two or three years and that does bring publicity,” the Head Coach admitted.

“But for us it is another game and one that we are looking forward to and trying to win the game. I think it will be two good teams – we will have to offer a threat to them, but have to be very wary of what they can bring as well; they have unbelievable squad depth with a lot of good players and have been building things for a little while.”

“We know we will have to bring our “A” game to get a result, but I believe that we can do that and I am looking forward to taking them on.” 

Reflecting on Tuesday’s draw with leaders Stockport County, Clemence said, “We were disrupted with Oli (Hawkins) being unwell meaning we had to change our game. I do my preparations for what training looks like on Monday and how we were going to play against Stockport only to come in Monday morning and no Oli.”

“We had to change one of two things and then it was all hands to the pump – he was so unwell, so I didn’t think he’d even be on the bench and he did really well even to feature in the game and to get thirty five minutes out of him, I was really pleased, especially as he made an impression when he came on.” 

“Tuesday was a good point whilst I thought the Swindon one – when we got done in the ninety-fourth minute was a bad point! We have left points on the pitch – I felt we deserved one at Newport, but we did not get it.”

“We have left a few points out there recently, but when I first came to the Club and even just past Christmas, we would win one, lose one, win one, lose one and we had not drawn any games.”

“At least now as we have lost twice in ten, that shows that we are competing with everybody – of course we would like to win more, but we are not getting beaten either.” 

“I think things are moving forward and if we can turn some of those draws into wins, then we will be heading in the right direction!” 

The away fixture was Clemence’s first League game in charge of the Club and the Head Coach was in reflective mood.

“It wasn’t the greatest start,” he recalled as the Gills went an early goal down after two minutes.

“We saw on that day that they have a lot of quality and a lot of squad depth, but we are a better team now; I think we have improved in a lot of areas!”

“We know that we have not been clinical enough at times, we will keep working at it. We have got to start picking up wins at home again after four draws here on the spin – we know that we have left points out there, but there are still thirteen games to go and a lot of points to play for!”

“All you can do as a football player is concentrate on the next game, and it is a big game, with a big crowd who will get right behind us, and the atmosphere will be electric!” 

“I’ve got an idea in my head how many we’ll need to win, but I’m not going to share that with you right now,” Clemence added.

“I have set targets to the team – you must challenge the team and you have to show them that is what we need to do! We try to put the games into blocks of five or six games and that’s how I have set the targets.” 

Player wise, Clemence confirmed Hawkins will be available for the weekend after fully recovering from his illness and hopes that George Lapslie may also be in contention for the matchday squad. 

He then went onto sadly confirm that Columbian winger Jorge Hurtado has had an operation back at his parent club Watford, but would not rule the young winger out of a possible return to Priestfield.

Josh Andrews is still to make his Gillingham bow and the Head Coach confirmed that the Club are awaiting scan results on the striker, whilst Dom Jeffries is still out and a few weeks away from returning.

Keeper Jake Turner will be assessed after picking up a heavily bruised hip on Tuesday and did not train Thursday with Glenn Morris on standby.