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Decision time at Priestfield

Gillingham manager Mark Stimson will decide who is up for next season's League 2 scrap when he meets his players one-on-one today.

The Gills lost their fight for survival on Saturday and fell into league football's bottom tier for the first time in 12 years.

A 2-1 defeat in front of almost 40,000 fans in Leeds, together with a win for relegation rivals Cheltenham, conspired to send the Gills down.

More than 1,000 Gillingham supporters made the trip north but they were left distraught as a long, hard season ended in the ultimate football failure – relegation.

Stimson has already indicated that strikers Leroy Griffiths, Georges Ba and goalkeeper Derek Stillie will be leaving and it is expected more could follow.

Stimson said: "I’ll be asking them if they are interested in getting Gillingham Football Club back into Division 1. It will mean 100 per cent commitment and it’s going to mean a hard training regime. Some of them won’t fancy that and if they don’t then we need to be honest with each other because without that, we’re going to get nowhere.

"Georges Ba won’t be kept, possibly Leroy Griffiths as well and Derek Stillie will probably leave us. The rest I would like to keep and work with and add one or two to that, plus some young players coming through and we can attack League 2."

Stimson has also come to terms with the fact that he won’t be able to keep experienced midfielder Kevin Maher at the club. He has been on loan from Southend.

Four other players are out of contract and unlikely to be offered new deals. They are Kelvin Jack, Tom Bryant, Craig Stone and Guylain Ndumbu-Nsungu.

Stimson will now hope to finally secure goalkeeper Simon Royce’s signature on an extended deal together with defender Danny Cullip.

See Monday's Medway Messenger for more news and views from Priestfield

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