Gillingham coach Ady Pennock was still clearly hurting when he spoke on Friday morning following his side being denied three points in midweek by Chesterfield’s 94th minute leveller at Priestfield.
“I thought Tuesdays was one of the best performances since we’ve been here – we created a lot of chances but everyone as desperately disappointed to have conceded with less than twenty seconds left,” Pennock told us. “The reason that I wasn’t happy is that I care so much about the club and the situation that we find ourselves in where we should be winning games like Tuesday really and truly – I care about the players and they so deserved the three points for their performance! The players care too and I think that showed on Tuesday. I don’t expect them to come in to the dressing room singing and dancing but at the end of the day they’re human beings and I think every Gillingham supporter and staff that I’ve got here were hurting. We didn’t lose but goodness it hurt. Dominating the game for 80 minutes we should have won it – on the flip side I thought we were poor on Saturday against Port Vale and we nicked the draw with Josh Parker at the very end. Tuesday as a different draw in so many ways…”
“It was unbelievably frustrating that we created so much – even in the first half when Rory (Donnelly) had that shot that came back off the inside of the post was unlucky! When you look back at the game we put a good shift in and it wasn’t through lack of trying – we should have seen the game out and to concede something late on to give them something that they didn’t deserve really hurt! There were a lot of positive’s that we can take into Coventry on Saturday and be a bit more clinical in front of goal hopefully as well as that clean sheet that we’re looking for. It’s a big pitch which has rugby played on in but it could be one of those games where if we can’t find space be have to go back to basics.”
Pennock then revealed that the squad had shown bounce-back-ability since the Chesterfield draw; “We had a great training session Thursday and the boys are buzzing again – and now really ready to go again. I expect the fans to expect us to win every game and make no mistake we go into every game looking to win it. I don’t go into games looking to draw them – I will always go into games looking to win then be it against Coventry or Sheffield United, we go out every week looking to win every game.”
Pennock was then asked his thought on the man currently charged with getting Coventry off the foot of the table – Russell Slade. The Gills boss said, “I think that Russell’s a very good manager who was harshly done by at Charlton. He’s a good man who I’m looking forward to meeting on Saturday. When I was at Forest Green, he was at Cardiff and we spoke to each other then, but I genuinely think that he’s a really nice guy and a very good coach / manager. So he’ll have his team playing well and getting in our faces come Saturday – it’s something that we’ll have to deal with to get the points. They’re in a false position in my view when you look at their team and squad – I guess the team has been affected with all the off field scenarios. We know that they’re not going to roll over – we’ve got to go there full of confidence and hopefully get that first win. I don’t think that the table lies but I do believe that we’ve in a false position at the moment as I think there have been games in the five draws we’ve had that we should have won – possibly winning three of the five – but we are where we are. We’ve stopped the rot as it were,” said the Gills boss tapping the table, “now we just have to push on again!”
“That first win is so important of course it is – the most important thing though has to be keeping away from that relegation zone and three points given the position that we are in will be massive. We’ve a big week ahead of us with another two home games coming up – let’s hope that we can get something on Saturday to set it up nicely!”