Gills Manager happy with display despite late defeat
Martin Allen praised his players for showing a continued desire to get back in the game following the 3-2 defeat to Crawley Town on Saturday.
Billy Clarke’s goal in the last ten minutes was enough to seal all three points for the hosts in a match which saw both sides reduced to 10 men early in the second half.
Martin said the loss of Charlie Lee was pivotal at the time at which he was dismissed, but gave the team credit for their efforts.
He said: “Overall I thought it was a good performance and a couple of set plays have cost us dear.
"The players put in fantastic effort and the decision to send off Charlie Lee was obviously crucial at that point.
“Leon Legge had to go off injured – Lee was shielding the ball off and it wasn’t even a foul and was given a yellow card. An unbelievable decision.
“The players are adaptable but with some of the players they have in decent positions, you could see they were quality players.
"They won 2-0 at Peterborough last week and signed a centre forward for £100,000 who came on in the last minute - it's a tough place to come.
"They give it everything they have got week in week out and it's testament to them that they keep going.
“They listen, they follow it, they want to do it and you could see how happy they were when Danny Kedwell scored that penalty.
“They want to turn these good performances in to victories and to concede from two set plays was particularly disappointing.
"We need to keep working at it and keep improving."
Martin was asked if Leon Legge, who was replaced by Devante McKain towards the end of the game, will be fit for the trip to Coventry next weekend.
“I’m not sure about Leggy or Charlie, I’m not sure if there is an appeal for a yellow card with the ball running out of play with the opposition player behind you, so we will probably miss him. With Leon we will review the situation as the week goes by.
“We have quite a few days for him to rest and get fit.”