A full week of training has come at a good time for Gillingham, according to the manager.
Mark Bonner’s side lost for the second time in five days on Saturday, beaten 2-0 at Crewe, and there are plenty of players in need of attention.
Manager Mark Bonner said: “We’ve got quite a few lads who have done a lot of games to this point.
“We’re ten games in now and some have played a lot of football, so a bit of a break in the games programme will help some and then there are others that missed either large parts of pre-season or have missed quite a bit of the last month that just need training.
“They just need time to get sharper, get fitter, and get up to speed.
“In the next five weeks, the four blank training weeks that we’ll get will really help us. It’ll get some of those up to speed and some of them know that they’re a little bit off it at the moment.”
Bonner’s been trying to manage a host of knocks and niggles in his squad.
Players like Ethan Coleman and Elliott Nevitt are playing but had disrupted pre-seasons because of injury, while Tim Dieng has just returned from time out injured.
There’s a whole host of players who need a bit of some TLC.
Bonner said: “Ethan didn’t really have an off-season or a pre-season. Timmy’s had quite a while out. There’s quite a few that have done a lot.
“Armani (Little) missed a bit of pre-season and then has played like every minute of every game and then the consequences of some being unavailable in the same position is someone like Robbie McKenzie just ends up playing almost every minute of every game and that takes its toll as well.”
Fans are waiting patiently to see Bradley Dack in full flow, the star summer addition has been limited to just an hour of first-team football so far.
Bonner said that Dack was “feeling his hamstring” ahead of the weekend so didn’t travel to Crewe.
“We don’t really know what that is,” the manager admitted.
“We just need to see how that settles over the next few days.
“It’s a slow burner and it’s going to be a long-term one with him, not in in terms of the injury, but getting him to be able to train and play repeatedly.”
Marcus Wyllie did travel but was left out of the 18.
“It’s a hard squad to pick at the minute,” Bonner said. “There’s so many that you could play.”
McKenzie picked up a weekend knock to add to the list of those with slight issues.
Bonner said: “Robbie got a whack really early in the game and he’s struggling a bit with his quad and on his ankle with that tackle so he had to come off at half-time, he couldn’t continue.
“We are a little bit like that. We went into the game with a few (issues).
“Armani’s been struggling with his knee. We rolled him out. (Remeao) Hutton has been struggling with his hamstring.
“Timmy’s just getting up to speed. Ethan’s getting up to speed and you can see that. Elliott’s had a really busy week in terms of three games.”
Bonner will hope to soon see defender Conor Masterson and Josh Andrews back available. Also out injured is winger Aaron Rowe and goalkeeper Jake Turner.
Gillingham return to first-team action on Saturday at home to Accrington Stanley.
