Martin Allen gives us his verdict on the Gills opening pre-season wins
The Gills made a perfect start to pre-season with back-to-back victories at Faversham Town and Ashford United and Martin Allen was very pleased with his team’s display, saying, “It’s been a lovely day. It started with a full English breakfast for my sister’s birthday which was cooked by John Schofield, so that was a good start to the day.“Then two good games of football and hopefully it’s been good for the two local Kent clubs. We’ve been well looked after at Ashford and Faversham Town and hopefully both those clubs have made some money from today and I think it’s important for Gillingham to get out into Kent.
“I think all four of our teams played with good spirit, they were competitive and respectful of the opposition and to see some of our 16 year-olds playing with The Champions was great. No injuries, everyone’s fine and of course two more wins, so that’s good.”
Among a number of good performances, trialist Tom Derry caught the eye playing a full 90 minutes at Ashford and Martin gave us a big of background on the mystery man, explaining “He was released by Charlton at Under-18 level where he was top goalscorer for their youth team, so I thought that’s not a bad gamble.
“He scores goals, he’s a good player and he’s only 18. We’ll have to weigh that one up when I have a chat with the Chairman. He’s definitely one to consider, he’s a bright boy and he scores goals so it’s sometimes good to take a gamble on those types of players, I’d say.”
Martin also revealed that he is expecting to complete another summer signing early next week, though the Gills boss refused to give us any details, adding, “We should have another player signing on Monday morning and that will be good as well.”
“It’s starting to come together now, we’ve all been patiently waiting for new players to sign. Mr Scally has been doing his bit and I think he might have delivered again.
“I don’t do a lot of that really. I speak to the agent and see if we’re within the range then if the Chairman can sort things out, that’s how we do it. I let the boss deal with that, it’s his money.”