The Official Cheltenham Town Match Thread (Sponsored by the 19th August 2025 "for all your eight months without a win under lights needs")

Gills head to Cheltenham this evening for a rearranged, if ultimately fairly meaningless fixture, thereby completing our collection of mostly dismal midweek showings for this season.  Our last midweek win came in just the fourth game of the season when still believed we were onto something special, gubbing Chesterfield 4-1 to extend our unbeaten start to the campaign.

Our newest unbeaten run now stands at three following Saturday's fairly uneventful goalless draw against a strong Salford side. We have also achieved two clean sheets on the spin, quite the feat for a side that was shipping goals for fun only a few weeks previously. It's amazing what a settled line-up featuring players selected in their strongest positions can do. Going forward we're still a little underwhelming, but slowly, slowly catchy monkey.

Tonight's opponents, Cheltenham currently sit four points adrift of us in 19th, although they do have a game in hand. They come into the game in decent form, just two defeats from their last 12 and with a stunning 0-4 thumping of Walsall at the Bescot Stadium last Saturday showing that they know where the net is. Steve Cotterill has proved a very shrewd appointment for the Robins, replacing former-Gill Mickey Flynn back in September with the Gloucestershire side rooted to the bottom of the table after ten games with just four points from 30 and having just been crushed 7-1 by Grimsby. Cotterill has turned a truly awful side into one that would be looking at a comfortable top half finish if he'd had the full season to play with. Another tough task awaits the Gills this evening.

The settled side that has turned our dreadful form around maybe under threat this evening. Garath McCleary played the last match carrying and injury and GA also wants to "try a couple of things...I need to have a look at some things that may be here next year, or I've maybe not made my mind up on next year.". This suggests some rotation and possibly more opportunities for some of the youngsters or fringe players, although those first teamers given a chance in the past have not exactly seized upon their opportunities. I'd rather he take a look at more youngsters than give more pitch time to those from the first team who have failed to stake a claim for regular football here.

There can't be too many head-to-heads that lean so heavily in our favour, although there was a 50 year gap in meetings between our Southern League days and the modern era. Tonight will be the 31st fixture between the two sides, Gills leading with 14 wins to 5, with 11 draws. Whaddon Road is a venue where we've not won too often (two from our last nine visits), but in terms of the highlights, it's a late brace from Cody Mac in March 2011 sparking delirium in the away end, especially with the last minute winner (wait for one fan taking a tumble onto the pitch from the stand).

A word on the scandalous ticket prices for this evening's fixture. £27.50 for an adult, £19.50 for Seniors and Students and £11.50 for kids with a further £2 increase for POTD. Outrageous on every level, the powers that be at Cheltenham should be ashamed of such egregious pricing, it certainly put me off attending the initial fixture and I can't make this rearranged one. Between those prices, the dead rubber nature of the game and the 500 miles round trip last Saturday, I would not be surprised if the away end numbers only a couple of hundred for tonight.

Safe travels if you're making the trip, here's hoping we can show that there's a platform for next season that is worth building on with another solid performance tonight.

Enjoy the game, and...

COYG!!!