Gillingham 0 Sheffield United 1

Match 59/13/1086 - Wednesday, 19th February 2014 - League One

Gillingham (0) 0
Sheffield United (1) 1 Coady 40
Att. 5,766

Entrance: Season Ticket
Programme: £3
Mileage: 45/5,883

Match Report

It’s after games like this that I appreciate that real journalists, although in the privileged position of being paid to watch football, have a real skill in producing even 500 words when they have watched a game as desperately poor as the one witnessed at Priestfield last night. Consequently, I cannot imagine this post is going to amount to very much!

Gillingham’s win-lose sequence now totals eight games and should this continue to the end of the season more than enough points would be accumulated to avoid relegation. That’s the good news.

The referee, Brendan Malone, drew the wrath of the Gillingham support with some questionable decisions but nobody should hide behind the fact that it was a poor performance that was the ultimate reason why the home club didn’t complete a double over Sheffield United, perceived as one of the big clubs of the division despite their lowly league position and quarter-finalists in this year’s FA Cup.

Gillingham started the game brightly and the new loanee centre back from Crystal Palace, Ryan Inniss found himself the centre of the action. It was another loan player, Connor Smith that fired in the first shot of the match after four minutes that was saved by Blades’ Mark Howard and three minutes later Inniss shot across the face of the goal missing the far post very narrowly.

Mr Malone had already turned away a couple of appeals for penalties when the Sheffield United central defender, Neill Collins wrestled Cody McDonald to the ground as the in-form striker threatened to get clear of his marker; however Malone interpreted the challenge, simulation on the part of McDonald or just two players coming together, only he knows. Gillingham fans will remain convinced he got it wrong and it proved to be a pivotal point in the game.

Five minutes before the break Sheffield United took a largely undeserved lead. With Inniss lying off the pitch injured a couple of yard to the right of the post, Gillingham’s defence went into disarray. A shot from Chris Porter came back off the underside of the crossbar to Connor Coady who rifled a controlled low shot into the net to the delight of the 351 Blades fans behind the goal. Inniss was immediately substituted and we hope that after 40 encouraging minutes this is not the last we see of him.

The second half is where it becomes difficult to write up and can be best described as a non-event. In fairness to Sheffield United, they did everything they needed to see the game out and acquire three precious points in their quest for safety. They controlled the midfield as the home side were, quite frankly, clueless in their attempts to break the visitors down. Peter Taylor introduced Chris Whelpdale and Myles Weston, but things just went from bad to worse. Amine Linganzi, Bradley Dack and Leon Legge had efforts that were dealt with comfortably by Howard whilst Dack was required to clear from the line following a shot from John Brayford as the home support became increasingly, and understandably, frustrated. The game meandered to its conclusion and it was something of a relief when Mr Malone put everybody out of their misery.

Envy is all I have for the hacks at the Emirates that were able to describe two missed penalties, a sending off and a couple of goals that appear to have cemented Bayern Munich’s passage in the Champions League. Their jobs, on the night, must have been really, really easy.