Substitute Aiden O’Brien gave Gillingham their eighth win in 13 against a much-depleted Crewe Alexandra at Priestfield last night after Callum Ainley had equalised just after the hour-mark for the visitors.
Manager Lee Bell made 5 changes from Saturday’s 1-0 defeat at Northampton Town as Dave Richards, Conor Thomas, Regan Griffiths, David Amoo and Elliott Nevitt all came into the side as James Beadle, Connor O’Riordan and Lachlan Brook were all on international duty, Charlie Colkett missed out due to injury and Courtney Baker-Richardson dropped down to the bench where he was joined by scholars Ty Webster and Zak Kempster-Down who both were involved in the first-team for the first time.
The opening chance fell to the visitors in the 15th minute with Rio Adebisi hitting his effort wide from a Griffiths corner before Amoo would find Dan Agyei whose effort was blocked just before the half-hour.
The opening goal of the game came in the 57th minute as Adebisi’s poor clearance went straight to Alex MacDonald with his cross converted by Tom Nichols from close range before the equaliser came 5 minutes later as a Joel Tabiner shot was blocked out to Ainley whose first-time finish on the turn was smashed into the top corner. The winner came with 18 minutes to play as a Luke Offord clearance went up in the air, fell into Nichols’ path who squared for O’Brien to open his Gills account.
The next games for the Alex see them travelling to Doncaster Rovers on Saturday 1st April before hosting Barrow on Good Friday (7th April).
What can we take out of this game?
It was another game that saw more goals that were easily preventable at one end while there was a stunner at the other.
Firstly for the opener, Rio takes his time on the ball before panicking a little and playing the ball straight to the opposition player before another worldie, this time from Ainley, got us back level. Then the second happens where Offord puts it up the air when he had the time to bring the ball under control with a bit more composure.