Gillingham chairman Brad Galinson on why head coach Stephen Clemence was sacked and updates fans on the interview process as they seek a replacement

Gillingham chairman Brad Galinson has explained the thinking behind the club’s decision to make a management change.

Head coach Stephen Clemence and his assistant Robbie Stockdale were axed on Monday and Mr Galinson - in an interview with the club - has spoken for the first time about his reasoning, a decision that came just a month after he had publicly backed his management team, regardless of how the season ended.

The Gills chairman thanked the pair for “serving the club and getting us through the season” and that they “remain terrific individuals.”

But Mr Galinson said: “It was an extremely bad day (on Monday) and an extremely difficult decision.

“The process that we went through to make that change, is that ultimately my responsibility is to the club and the community and to the fans.

“Because of the poor form we had at the end of the season, I was faced with going through the summer and going through recruitment, starting next season and if the first few months didn’t go well it is very difficult to change a manager in the middle of a season.

“Ironically, although we have been through two managers in my brief tenure here, I actually think that breaking continuity is a very damaging thing to an organisation.

“It is a last resort thing that anyone at the club, certainly me, would want to do, but the conclusion was that we’re impatient, our fans are impatient, I am impatient, the club is impatient and the expectations for promotion are strong.

“With our budget and the reality of the size of our club, we fully expect to get out of this league, as I have said many times.

“The end result was that we needed to make a change now so that the new person in charge had pre-season and very importantly recruitment time and can