Carlisle United 1 Gillingham 0: Reaction from Gills boss Neil Harris after their League 2 defeat

Gillingham manager Neil Harris warned his team of what was to come moments before Carlisle United hit what turned out to be the winner.

The Gills had edged the first 45 minutes at Brunton Park without having the killer touch to make it count and Harris knew there would be a fightback from the hosts. Carlisle started the second half strongly and scored a scrappy goal that turned out to be the difference between the sides.

Report: Carlisle 1 Gillingham 0

“First half we were the better team,” said the Gills boss, after their fourth defeat of the season.

“It was a scrappy first half, we limited Carlisle to one cross in the box, they got a free header and we could have done better with that but other than that we gave them nothing, away from home, for 45 minutes.

“We got into really good areas but probably didn’t use the ball well enough, certainly didn’t use our set-plays as well as we should have done, but we were the team in the ascendency, we were the better team first half, but we knew there would be a reaction.

“We warned the players because the (home) fans got on their backs at half-time, we knew there would be a response.”

Harris warned his team, which wasn’t short of experience anyway, but could only watch as the hosts came at them, as expected.

“You have to let the leadership take over,” he said. “You have to let the mind of the players take over, so they say ‘right how do we manage this game now?’

“On the pitch I had Glenn Morris, Max Ehmer, Stuart O’Keefe, Ben Reeves, Mikael Mandron, Jordan Green is not a kid, Cheye Alexander, David Tutonda, there was experience on the pitch to manage it.

“Sometimes you have to say ‘well done’ to the opponent, they played on the front foot and all they did was get the ball forward