For Gillingham boss Steve Lovell, it was a quiet deadline day after he’d done so much of his own business early in pre-season.

Speaking at his weekly press briefing, the Gills boss looked forward to welcoming relegated Burton Albion to Priestfield for the club’s first home game of the season following on the back of last weekend’s 2-1 win at Accrington Stanley.

“They’ll come here, and they will cause us problems,” Lovell said.  “We’ve got to make sure that we put on the same level of performance to last week and if we do that, I’m sure we’ll get a similar result to that of last week. They have some good quality players in their team despite being relegated last season and we’ve got to make sure that we’ll be at our best.”

Speaking as the rain poured down, we considered how conditions have changed in such a short time and how that effects what we see.  The Gills boss admitted, “It was a different challenge for us and we’re looking forward to it!  First home game of the season is always a bit special and it’s important to put on a good performance for our own supporters.”

“Last year, I think we put on some good displays here, but didn’t get as many points as we should have and that’s something that we’ve got to do better this year.”

“But as I’ve said before, if we perform like we can do, we’ll get the results.  We’ve got a quality squad and if we perform like we can do we’ll cause Burton a lot of problems and that’s what we’ve got to do week in, week out.”

Then attention then turned to Deadline Day… “Unless something drastic happens, we’ve not really got to do anything at the moment, but if needs be the loan window is still open until the end of the month.”

“We’re always looking – we’ve to get through and if you’re lucky with injuries, but if we need to, we’ll go into the loan market. We’ve signed players early and it’s made it tight and enjoyable already.”

“We’re building for a better future at the club, so why should we want anyone to leave? After a good win last weekend, with everyone fully fit, I do believe that we could have a very good season.”

“Last Saturday’s win is so important – two goals away from home, a clean sheet and three points is a good start and helps boost morale and confidence, but it can easily come down like a tonne of bricks in the next game if we let our performance levels drop – we’ve got to give Burton some credit as you can bet that they’ll come here on Saturday looking for all the points!”

“The rain will help us as we played on a lot of pitches where the grass was long and sticky, and it slowed the game down. We played on a pitch at Accrington last week with shorter watered grass and it was lovely!”

“There was no coincidence that we played the game quicker with quick passes on the floor, it obviously helped us as we’re a quick side.”

“So, I think that a greasy pitch will help us and I think that it adds to the spectacle if you’re able to zip the ball around.  The ground-staff have done wonders with the pitch for the weekend, although they’ll be panicking now with all the rain, that this pitch will get cut up after all the hard work.”

“But it’s great out there all ready for the first home game of a new season and hopefully we’ll get a good crowd – really looking forward to it”