Mark Bonner has every confidence Gillingham can end their long search for a victory this weekend – and with it end Port Vale’s winning run.
In terms of league form, Saturday’s match is a top-versus-bottom encounter, with the Gills taking just one point from their last six games and Port Vale picking up 16 points from a possible 18.
The Valiants have won their last five games and haven’t lost in the league since the end of August. Gillingham, in contrast, have taken just a point from their last six matches in the division, slipping from top of the table to 11th heading into the weekend
League 2’s full of surprises, however, and Bonner doesn’t see Port Vale as much different to any others in the division.
He said: “Over the first third of the season we’ve played against teams at the top quite often. We’ve had a lot of those challenges that we’ve coped with, actually, really well in a number of ways.
“I think to have that as your first game back after a bit of a break it’s a good one. To be home is a good thing.
“You can’t detach yourself from the overall run. But actually, if you just go back a little bit and go, ‘all right, we should have won the game at Swindon, but we took a point and we ended a run of defeats’.
“We’re not patting ourselves on the back for exiting the FA Cup [losing to Blackpool last weekend] because we really wanted to get through in it but we played really well last week and so we’ve gone into this week in a little bit of a mindset of a great time to be back playing league football.
League 2 table
“(Port Vale) are a really good opponent to play against. Obviously, a League 1 team last year with a lot of players from good levels.
“I think they’ve added really well in the summer as well to that squad. And their run of form speaks for itself. They’ve got an experienced management team, experienced players, players that have played higher levels, whether that was last year or beyond that.
“They’re in a really good vein of form. But as I’ve said a number of times, runs only ever go on so long.
“They’ll be trying to maintain theirs, obviously. We’ll be trying to get a W on the board as soon as possible. And that’s a great challenge to try and do it at the weekend.”
Quizzed on the size of the challenge ahead, Bonner said: “It isn’t that big. It’s two League 2 teams that are decent playing against each other.
“The difference between the top and the bottom of this league isn’t that big.
“They’re a good side, but they’re along the lines of many others. We’ll play bigger games, I hope, this year.
“What it is, is a team that are in really good form with very good players but when we’re at our best, we’re a good team with good players. You can make it feel as big as you want.
“We need a result. But we can’t play desperate. We need to play with a bit of confidence.
“We need to show an aggression in the way we go after them. We need to make it a hard day for them and we’ll do that by doing the things we do well.”
