Gillingham boss Steve Evans is like a child on Christmas Eve with the new SKYBet League One season beginning on Saturday.
The Gills boss has been counting down to the big kick-off this weekend since the start date was confirmed and has made no secret of the fact that all roads lead to September 12th and the opening day…
Speaking to KSN this week ahead of Hull City’s trip to Priestfield, the Gills boss admitted again, “From our point of view, it’s always been about trying to get ready for the start of the season.”
“Now it’s here, everyone in football and in League One will be excited because it’s been a long time since we played competitive football, but we have to accept that it’s different times.”
“No supporters will make a huge difference – I think that there will be inconsistent results all over many Leagues at the weekend from the teams who have never experienced it, and we have to make sure that we’re focused and ready to play football minus the spectators.”
“We said it all pre-season that this is what you’re going to get and that’s why we kept all our games to our training ground games – we could have gone and played Non-League opposition and had a few spectators around, but we wanted to prepare like we’re going to be in the League.”
“It is different – some players will blossom without the pressure of spectators whilst some players won’t be able to get that little niche – half a yard if you like – on the front foot that they get from the buzz of the fans in the ground.”
“So there can be opposites, but we just want our players to go out and work as hard as they would with or without spectators and if they do that we can at the end ask no more because we believe they’re talented – this is the toughest League One that I can remember in a long, long time.”
“I think there are eleven teams who have played in the top level of English football in this division this season ahead – that shows how difficult it is!”
Evans’ side improved throughout last season and when asked of his hopes for 2020/2021, the Gills boss said, “We’ve always said that we’d like to improve every year – we finished tenth although I still think that if the League had finished it would have been around eighth – I don’t think we’d have quite got to the Play Off group.”
“So, we had to look in the summer as we lost a lot of players as we turned up on the first day of training with eight players. So it’s been very difficult to put a group together, so the Chairman and myself took the decision that we were going to work on the strategy that involved younger players and players with potential on the training ground and let’s work with them and develop them and coach them.”
“And we know some weeks that’s going to be difficult for us as we’re bringing a new group – a lot of younger players together – but what we do know is every week that goes past in the season and every month that goes past (and we said this last year – and it came true towards the end of the season when we were flying) is that it takes time to integrate, it takes time to build up, it takes time for players understanding each other – we’re working so hard and we will get there.”
Evans knows that his new look side face a significant test come 3:00pm on Saturday afternoon; he told us, “they have significant, talented players – I’m good friends with their manager (Grant McCann) and I shared a beer with him recently in my local and we were discussing things.”
“I think that the only reason they came down is because Grant went months without some of his best players, and then he had – what I think is unthinkable in football – four or five players who decided not to play beyond a certain date to protect themselves which I think was wrong, and yet the person who got hung out to dry was Grant McCann which is a real travesty.”
“But they are in League One now – they will be a force to be promoted to the Championship immediately. They have the resources in place in two good owners, who continue to back the club despite these troubled times.”
“We will have to be ready because they’re full of good players and have from a distance, Grant has made some really good signings.”
One Hull player whose Priestfield return is looking unlikely because of injury is former favourite Tom Eaves, of whom the Gills boss had this to say.
“I gave Tom his debut many moons ago in the Football League when he came on loan to Rotherham – he’s a great kid who came alight here at Priestfield and set his career alight. It’s a shame he’ll be injured on Saturday as despite the fact that there’s no fans, I think everyone around the Football Club would make him feel very welcome. I certainly know that if we did have supporters in the ground, he’d get a nice reception!”