Gillingham FC Forum

Bristol Rovers lead the wins 44 to 38 (19 draws) but the Gills are unbeaten in the last 5 meetings, winning 4 of them.

Bristol Rovers have won 15 of their last 19 home league games and their 2-1 defeat by Bolton was their only defeat in that time.

Rovers failed to score in their last home game (0-0 in the EFL trophy) but the last time in the league was 23 games ago (October 2015).

The Gills and Bristol Rovers are the only 2 sides in League 1 yet to keep a clean sheet! Rover's run stretches 14 league games, the Gills 18.

3.02 Kick Off

3.21
Gills forced to make yet another early sub: Cody off, Nouble on.

3.50 Half-time: 0-0

4.07
The second half kicks off.

4.24
GOAL! Bristol Rovers 0-1 Gillingham: Wright
Rovers have now conceded the opening goal in 9 of their 12 games previously recovering 50.0% of the points. Only the Gills (52.4%) and Bradford (66.7%) won more.

4.44
GOAL! Bristol Rovers 1-1 Gillingham: Lines

4.52
GOAL! Bristol Rovers 2-1 Gillingham: Harrison

4.57 FULL-TIME: 2-1

Position: 18th
Attendance: 9,489 (389)
Referee: Jonathan Brookes

Fact is...............this MUST be a win for the Good Guys, if it isn't then I fear Mr Glasgow will be sailing down the river, don't know which river, probably the Medway I am sure they will give him a ride back to Gillingham, but if they lose big time, then it might well be down the Avon Gorge and under the Clifton Suspension Bridge.

A tough trip to Bristol Rovers on Saturday,they have some good players one of which is Matt Taylor who is a decent striker.They have started well to life in League one with 16 points so far.I`m not too confident with us leaking around two goals a game,so a point is probably the best we can hope for on Saturday the way things are going at the moment.

What would be your Team?

What will the team be for Saturday?
That's a good question well presented, unfortunately there is no answer. last Saturday there were players who were missing from the announced squad, within minutes it was all change with no explanation. Again you never know if a player will be in defence, midfield, attack, Jed seems to like playing people out of position. If we were winning every week then none of this would matter, indeed people would happily cheer and clap and take no notice, unfortunately we're not and Jed blunders on oblivious to the poor quality of the football. So to answer the question, I think Jed will again pick names from a hat, then try to shoehorn them into positions before sitting in the dugout with his fingers crossed.

Kerslake said today we have a fully fit squad to choose from (excluding the out-for-the-season players of course). I would play (not the 11 expect to get):

.........................Nelson

Jackson.......Ehmer.......Oshilaja.......Konchesky

............Hessenthaler.....Osadebe

.....Wagstaff.........Dack...........Knott

........................Cody

If choosing the team I would play, rather than what we'll get from Jed, I'll offer the following.

...........................Nelson..............................

Jackson.......Oshilaja.........Ehmer..........Konchesky

Wagstaff..................Dack...................Osadebe

Nouble....................Cody.....................Jet

It won't improve our defence, but it will frighten the begeebers out of the opposition defence.

I think Gillingham will line up as follows.......................

------------------------------------Nelson---------------------------------------
Herd----------------Ehmer--------------------Oshilaja-----------------Konchesky
---------------------Wright------------------Hessenthaler-------------------------
Wagstaff---------------------------Dack---------------------------------------Knott
----------------------------------McDonald------------------------------------------

Subs: Bond (GK), Jackson, Pask, Byrne, Nouble, Emmanuel-Thomas, List

I would try and name an consistent back five game in, game out, as the constant changes from a flat back four, to three / five at the back combined with injuries and suspensions isn't helping Gillingham's Defence at all, this means no starting role for Ryan Jackson - who might come on as substitute later on in the game - and no starting role for Jonathan Bond, however, if Stuart Nelson makes anymore error's, then we can expect to see Jonathan Bond being given The Number One Role for the foreseeable future.

I would play Jake Hessenthaler and Josh Wright in the two defensive holding midfielder roles - why Jake Hessenthaler was on the left wing last week, I have no idea ???, and I have gone with a front four of Scott Wagstaff, Bradley Dack, Billy Knott and Cody McDonald, and with the possibility of Frank Nouble, Jay Emmanuel-Thomas and Elliott List all on the substitutes bench, Justin Edinburgh would have plenty of attacking options to call upon, if we needed a goal to win/ draw the match against Bristol Rovers.

Early start for me tomorrow, here's hoping that Gillingham can get back on track with a win against Bristol Rovers - COME ON THE GILLS!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is rapidly becoming a crisis I think. Taking the lead is clearly not working; we need to fall behind and then win with a couple of late goals- that's clearly the way forward! It seems to me that we are completely lacking in fitness; is that because we are giving too much in the early exchanges? I imagine it must be hard to pace yourself as a footballer but if we are constantly collectively running out of steam after 80 minutes then obviously we will continue to concede late goals.

Fitness or confidence to keep a clean sheet and therefore lose the points? At the start of the season we'd bang in 3 goals so it might not matter but scoring 1 and holding onto it appears to be impossible. I genuinely don't how we resolves this. The figures are incredibly high compared to previous seasons for both winning and losing (for those who didn't see it, check out last week's Fact of the Day section to see the table with the comparisons in).

We sounded the better Team,then we scored and you start to think maybe today for a clean sheet.Then they piled on the pressure and scored,and you could have bet your house on them scoring again in the last minute,which they did.The same pattern keeps happening so something has to be done quickly.Two home games now,a big week for the Club.I would say Edinburgh needs a good points return this week.