Gareth Ainsworth was pleased with how Gillingham's homegrown players applied themselves during the 1-0 pre-season friendly defeat against Charlton Athletic on Saturday.
Reece Burke scored the only goal of the game for the visitors at the MEMS Priestfield Stadium, heading in a corner at the back post from close range, minutes after the Gills made ten changes to the team that started the fixture. Despite the early setback for such a young group, Ainsworth was glad that they tried their best in taking the game to their Championship opponents.
The Gills boss also touched upon the importance of players being able to be reliable in multiple positions after Sam Gale played the first hour of the game at right wing-back.
Gillingham welcome Millwall to ME7 on Tuesday night, and Ainsworth is looking forward to seeing how his side will compete against strong opposition who were ever so close to promotion to the Premier League.
Positives from the friendly...
We had a real bonus on 60 minutes with our homegrown players coming on, with a couple of exceptions who weren't with us right from the start, but it was absolutely fantastic to see some of the young boys come on and get some first team experience. It's a first team game in a pre-season friendly, and it was brilliant. We are really proud of them.
Me and Pete [Gill] were shouting, as we didn't want them to sit back. We wanted them to go and be brave and have a go, and they did. We had some good chances there.
The first 60 worked really well. We looked very solid. We knew we would be out of possession today. It's Charlton Athletic... and that is really encouraging for me. There were some nice first looks at home for our new signings. We have got one or two knocks. Will Goodwin and Ronan Hale would have played today if it was a league game. It was just a precaution.
The importance of multi-positional players...
We have a couple of multi-positional players. I think that Robbie McKenzie so far has played right-sided centre-back, as a ten and as a central midfield player in the three games, as we had one behind closed doors amongst ourselves. Having multi-positional players is really important.
It is something that we will have to work on. I want to slim the squad down. There have been way too many players here in the past, and that becomes difficult for a manager.
I am really pleased. I thought that Sam [Gale] did okay. I think that Sam is an athlete, as much as anything. He will never give up, and he will be up and down that wing, and we can work on some of the finer details that we think might make him into a good fill in right-back or right wing-back. He is a fantastic one-v-one centre-half as well, so we aren't discounting him there.
Looking to Millwall on Tuesday...
It will be very similar, but what I will say is that Millwall will be an even sterner test than Charlton. When you look at the Championship last year, they were almost in the Premier League. Alex Neil is a really good manager, and I managed against him a lot. We are going to get another stern test.
The boys are going to be fit, we are going to be out of possession, and we know that there are certain games in League Two where we will be out of possession. In certain games, it will be like the Dover game, where we have the ball, and we can then manipulate it. It is not always easy keeping the ball against these Championship sides, as they are there for a reason.
That will be a tough test, but I am sure that the fans will turn up and again get behind some of these young boys that are coming through.
Transfer update...
We still want a couple more in. Two or three in the building before I start the season or maybe before the end of the window. Just to make my squad as full as I want.
