Gareth Ainsworth praises ‘amazing’ Gillingham after narrow Wimbledon win

Gareth Ainsworth hailed his Gillingham side as “amazing” after they secured a second-successive home win with a 1-0 League Two victory over AFC Wimbledon.

Joe Gbode came off the bench to score the only goal of the game as the Gills put a major dent in the Dons’ automatic promotion hopes with a 10th game without defeat.

Ainsworth, who is yet to lose since taking charge of the club, said: “It was an amazing performance. The players were absolutely outstanding.

“They emptied every last bit of energy they had for me out there.

“I was bringing players off who couldn’t walk anymore because they had put that much into it.

“The boys came in on Easter Sunday to work on a new bit of shape which I thought would cause them problems and it did.

“Wimbledon are a very big, physical side but I said if we matched them mentally and physically then we had a chance because we’ve got good footballers who can play.

“We were winning every header, threw ourselves at every ball. There was a block right at the end where there were two bodies flying at it.

“I’m really proud of the boys. We’ve got that identity now.

“It was a brilliant goal to win it. Hopefully we will have more days like this. It’s not going well, but it’s going OK at the moment.”

Johnnie Jackson’s side are five points off the automatic promotion pace with only two games to go after winning just one of their last seven.

And Jackson said: “I’m disappointed, naturally. I don’t think we did enough.

“It’s a tough season. It’s a tough league. Listen, these players have given everything to put themselves in this position.

“Realistically, getting in the top three looks very difficult. What we have to do is make sure we get into those play-off positions.

“We have to shake this one off and the players need to be open and honest with themselves.

“There is no time to wallow. We need to get back to work ahead of another big game.

“We need to remember the position we’re in and go again.

“We were poor in the second half. We stopped doing what got us success. We wasted possession too many times. We’ve got ourselves to blame for that.

“The only bit of quality in the game was the goal really. It’s a good goal. That’s a good bit of quality that we just didn’t have.

“I don’t think there was anything between the teams except that moment.”