Manager Steve Lovell is hoping to put Saturday’s 2-1 loss to Bury behind him and the Gillingham players.

Trailing 2-0 in the opening 25 minutes, The Gills faced an uphill battle against the League One strugglers and despite clawing one back through Connor Ogilvie, they couldn’t take any points from the game.

Having seen his side lose away from home, Lovell admitted it was one of the worst performances since he took charge after Peter Taylor’s departure:

“I thought it was most probably the worst 45 minutes since we took over, but you have to give credit to Bury. They had a a really good go, caused us problems in the first half and they thoroughly deserved to go 2-0 up.

“It was disappointing really after the good run we have had but all good runs come to an end and we now need to dust ourselves down and get ready for next week.

“I think in the second half, the last 30 minutes, we put pressure on and we had a number of opportunities where we perhaps should have got a point out of the game.

“We created a number of opportunities but just couldn’t take them.”

Despite losing, Lovell is optimistic his side can take positives from the game after a run that has seen The Gills look towards the play-off places:

“The boys have done brilliant, all of them, we’ve had a really good run. You’re not going to perform miracles every weekend. Bury are fighting for their lives and over the 90 minutes I think they deserved their three points.

“The damage was done in the first half by conceding two goals. We are not too disappointed, we are to not have won the game, but we’ll go and work hard ready for next week.

“I’m not going to get carried away with one 45 minutes of football, all I will do is take the plusses out of our second half performance.”

Lovell will now prepare his side for Saturday’s visit of Rotherham United to Priestfield, although weather forecasts are already casting doubt on the game with heavy snow expected for Friday.