Faversham Town 0 Gillingham 1

Match 2/17/1450 - Friday, 7th July 2017 - Pre-Season Friendly

Faversham Town (0) 0
Gillingham (1) 1 Eaves 22
Attendance: 1,214

Entrance: £6
Programme: £2
Mileage: 50/184

Match Report

As with the opening post of this pre-season, there is little reason to get downhearted (or upbeat) about results, good or bad, least of all the very first one. All you can do is assemble a few positives or negatives that need to be addressed over the next five weeks.

Gillingham looked okay and should have put the game to bed in the first half in which they were the dominant side, but, opening negative, wayward finishing from goalscorer Tom Eaves in particular left the game in doubt until the final whistle. Indeed, it took a fine save from Stuart Nelson at the feet of Faversham's Sam Lawford late in the game to preserve the scoreline.

Drawing on the positives, Eaves did look a handful but, as said, his finishing had all the hallmarks of a striker that has found goals hard to come by at his previous clubs, Yeovil, Shrewsbury and Bolton.

A major plus was the return of Bradley Garmston, who produced a lively second period down the left hand side.

On the minus side, none of the trialists came close to fulfilling the criteria of being better, or at least different, to what you already have; the first half in particular the back four made up of new signing Gabriel Zakuani, Max Ehmer and two trialists looked shaky.

Gillingham won the game in the 22nd minute when a fine move saw Mark Byrne send Scott Wagstaff away down the right and his pin-point cross to the feet of Eaves left the striker with a tap-in.

Eaves had an effort brilliantly saved by Simon Overland, but a free header from a Wagstaff cross was wasteful in the extreme.

With a completely different eleven in the second period, Gillingham started well with Garmston excelling and Josh Parker looking dangerous but as the half wore on and Faversham made their own bundle of substitutions it was the non-league side that finished the stronger despite them looking tender in years.

The downside, personally, was that I saw very little to dispel my feeling that the coming season is going to be a real struggle but from low expectations ...