The quality will come, insists Gillingham manager Gareth Ainsworth.
The Gills return to Priestfield to face fellow mid-table Fleetwood this Saturday after claiming a last-gasp win at relegation-threatened Barrow a week ago.
It’s a fortnight on from a 3-0 home loss against Oldham, when Ainsworth’s team were booed off, with chants of “you’re not fit to wear the shirt”.
The Gillingham manager accepts the football might not always be pretty, but that it’s a work in progress.
He said: “I know that sometimes we lack a bit of quality around the box. But it’s coming. We’re working on it and I’m really pleased.
“We want to show the home fans what we can do.
“Sometimes it may look a little bit untidy. It might look a little bit [that we’re] putting it on teams too much.
“But, if we can get that quality in the final third, I think you’ll see a different system.”
Gillingham ended a run of three straight defeats without scoring when they beat Barrow 1-0. Robbie McKenzie’s winner came with seconds left.
Ainsworth said: “I really enjoyed that. Even though there was a little lack of quality and we could have got more goals, we finally got the job done.
“For me, that’s all we needed to do. Win the game. They won it with 15 seconds to go – that’s the best way to win it for me!
“Sometimes you have to put it on the [opposition] team. The lads executed what I wanted to do really well.
“I know some of the fans go, ‘Oh, we’re not pretty’. We will be one day. But, at the moment, let’s find a way to win in League 2.
“Away at Barrow, that was the way to win. I was really pleased for the boys – they needed that.
“We are going to put it on teams. I like that. That’s my style of football.
“I like teams being difficult to beat and putting it on teams. That’s how we’ll play.”
The Gills remain 16th in League 2 and a long way off the play-off places.
Ainsworth’s target is to try and finish as high as they can.
He said: “We come away [from Barrow] with three points and it’s a big three points because I think there were a few people looking over our shoulder rather than looking above. I don’t want that to happen.
“I want to make sure that we are ploughing forward, getting this plan right.
“I want this momentum to go again. I want to keep looking up and see how far we can finish.”
Ainsworth’s team haven’t been able to make a challenge at the top end of the table this season, but the manager has praised the owners for their support in what is the first full season of a two-year plan that’s been put in place.
He said: “Brad and Shannon (Galinson) have been fantastic. Calm as anything.
“We know where we are. We know what we’re doing. We know where the future is, and we want to get there with you [the fans].
“But as a manager, you don’t want to lose four in a row.
“That was a big win for me [last week]. I’m really proud and thankful to the boys for their efforts.”
