With the start of the new SKYBET League Two season now less than two weeks away, we’ve been talking to Gillingham boss Neil Harris about all things Gillingham and over the next couple of days we get right up to date with the man tasked with getting the Gills back into League One. 

We started this first part of our conversation by taking the Gills back to the start of last season when there was just hope around Priestfield rather than the genuine optimism there seems to be this year which has carried on from May. 

“Hope’s a big word in football,” Harris admitted, “Last year we really were living on hope and the hope that experience may get us through. I think we were kidding ourselves really that we were in some sort of position of “strength” given our relegation.

“But this year is so completely different as we know that we’ve got a core of a squad that can compete and competed really well in the second half of last season. Its probably just fine tuning that and adding perhaps a little bit more quality to it, certainly at the top end of the pitch – that can be the difference between successful and really successful!” 

“It’s been frustrating that we’ve been linked with a lot of good players over the summer but I look at it two ways. We look at most thinking ‘he’s a good player, but we’re not getting him – no not in a million years is he coming here, we cant attract him! – yet’. But you look at the other side and think it’s a positive as people are seeing us grow as a Football Club.

“Some of the names that have been linked are so far off the mark, it’s a joke it really is. The big positive I take from it is that people genuinely think its realistic, and I have a chuckle and we do laugh about it as a group. It raises peoples expectations that we can get that player or that player, so when you don’t get them, the fans start asking why we didn’t get that lad from the Premier League who’s on ninety grand a week.” 

“It does go both ways and my job is to manage those expectations and make sure that within the building that we’re content with what we’ve got and who we are! We’ve been building expectations all summer and been linked with a lot of players and then we win in Italy – albeit against a Serie B team which is a great scalp to take away from, and it all builds the expectation.  

“Como was a great experience for all of us. Some of the boys hadn’t been abroad before, a lot of them had certainly never played abroad before and then we’ve got players who have played European and International football – myself and Dave Livermore have both been on the sidelines, yet it was still surprising to see so much Gillingham blue when we walked out.

“The biggest thing of all is that you get to build so much, it’s the quickest way to build a bond within a changing room is to be together for four or five days solid and it’s the best way for managers to build a team is over the course of  pre-season which is one of the reasons that you want your players in as quickly as possible as a manager. You look at our core group which may be two or three missing, but its there and developing, it was a fantastic, top drawer trip! 

“We came home and competed really well in two halves of football – one against Millwall and one against Charlton, and in the other half we’ve been beaten by a better team, so where does that leave the expectations now?

“Maybe a bit more of a reality is that we are a League Two side fighting with six or seven teams who have got bigger budgets than us to get in that top seven this year which sounds absolutely crazy to me but that’s the level we’re at, it’s a bonkers League this year.

“My job is certainly to manage that expectations by doing interviews and talking post match it does help manage that expectation but flip it around and we don’t want to take away the excitement and the feel good factor from everybody as ultimately that’s what’s driven us on for the last seven months.” 

The new signings that Harris has made during the summer seem to have fitted in well as the boss explained. “Jonny Williams has done a bit of settling into clubs so he’s fine; Conor Masterson of course knows the lads already from last season and Max Clark is just a really good lad who knows a couple of the lads and is best friends with Robbie McKenzie so he’s straight in the core group and settled in.

“We got Shadrack Ogie in last week and have only just seen a couple of training sessions and at Dartford at the weekend and am looking forward to seeing him this week in games against Cambridge and Dagenham but he’s a player who is developing so bodes well for the coming seasons.

“We’re still tweaking so there might still be a couple go out of the building so that they can play first team football more regularly and still hope that one or two will come into the building to just add more attacking options for us!”