Gillingham are out of the League One relegation zone… for now at least!
Over 120 days after defeat at home to Portsmouth sent Steve Evans’ side into the division’s bottom four, and just forty-seven days after Neil Harris inherited a side ten points adrift of safety, a truly magnificent performance against Play Off chasing Sheffield Wednesday earned the Gills the point that somehow gives them an advantage over AFC Wimbledon in the fight for survival.
In front of Priestfield’s biggest gate for some time – buoyed by a truly magnificent travelling support numbering over three and a half thousand – Harris recalled the fit again pair of Aaron Chapman and Ryan Jackson back into the starting eleven that had fallen to defeat in midweek at Charlton.
And it really wasn’t “just” a rear-guard performance (Wednesday did “enjoy” seventy percent of the possession) as the home side had the chances that could have pulled off their biggest win of the season. Vadaine Oliver fired an early chance straight at Irish international keeper Bailey Farrell-Peacock and Charlie Kelman won a superb header from a deep Stuart O’Keefe centre but couldn’t direct his header goalwards.
In a first half that the Gills played football that Priestfield hadn’t seen for most of this long season and the Irish keeper showed his class with a stunning double save just before the break to first deny Kelman and then Oliver’s rebound.
Kelman just after the break was again denied by Wednesday’s keeper as David Tutonda’s long ball was missed by the visitors back line and Farrell-Peacock produced a great block to deny the QPR loanee.
Shortly after there was a sickening clash of heads between O’Keefe and Oliver which left the Gills skipper with a cut under his eye – fortunately both were able to continue the battle after treatment.
Wednesday finally looked like a side going for the Play Offs in the final twenty minutes – Chapman pulled off a super save to deny Barry Bannon’s curling effort before the same player curled one just over the bar shortly after.
The travelling support thought they’d nicked a completely undeserved win with just seven minutes left on the clock as Lee Gregory tucked the ball past Chapman after being played forward, but from almost nowhere, Jack Tucker appeared to scramble the ball off the line.
Gillingham were within a hair’s breadth of a late winner – Oliver beating Bailey-Farrell but sadly the post too – but the home faithful had finally witnessed a performance that they had waited for since August that every single one of them could be proud of, and more importantly a point that lifts the Gills out of the bottom four courtesy of AFC Wimbledon’s 3-1 defeat at Cheltenham which tonight almost unbelievably puts the Londoners a point behind Harris’ Heroes!
Points on the board or games to play. Neil Harris and the Gillingham faithful will say points especially this evening as the survival bid now heads North to Accrington next weekend…
GILLINGHAM – Chapman, Jackson, Tucker, Ehmer, Masterson, Tutonda, O’Keefe, Lee, Thompson, Kelman, Oliver.
Subs not used – Dahlberg, Lintott, Maghoma, Akehurst, Chambers, Dickson-Peters.
Booked: Jackson (57), Masterson (77), Kelman (94).
SHEFFIELD WEDNESDAY – Peacock-Farrell, Hunt (Mendez-Laing 61), Storey, Hutchinson, Dunkley, Johnson, Byers (Dean 79), Luongo, Bannan, Gregory, Paterson (Berahino 62).
Subs not used – Wildsmith, Iorfa, Kamberi, Sow.
Booked: Dunkley (14), Bannan (83), Hutchinson (87).
Referee – Mr Gavin Ward
Attendance: 7,433 (3295 Sheffield Wednesday).
Picture supplied by Gillingham Football Club.