Accrington Stanley boss John Coleman was satisfied with what he saw as the Reds drew 0-0 at Gillingham to pick up well-deserved point and clean sheet after a nightmare journey down to Kent.

In a game of few chances, Reds keeper Toby Savin produced an excellent stop to keep out Max Ehmer’s header on 27 minutes, before the unmarked Vadaine Oliver headed over the bar from the resulting corner.

Ethan Hamilton’s shot forced Gillingham goalkeeper Jamie Cumming into action while Harry Pell poked an effort wide inside the box with the visitors’ best chance of the opening half.

Oliver squandered a brilliant chance to put the hosts ahead on the stroke of half-time as he somehow shot wide with the goal at his mercy after Savin had spectacularly kept out John Akinde’s goal-bound header.

Accrington defender Ross Sykes bravely blocked Stuart O’Keefe’s volley approaching the hour, before Pell’s effort on the turn saw Cumming produce a good reaction save.

Gillingham twice almost won the game six minutes from time, as Colby Bishop cleared Jack Tucker’s header off the line before Kyle Dempsey’s cross-turned-shot rebounded off the post.

He said: “On the balance of play you’d say 0-0 was a fair result. I’m delighted to get the clean sheet – it’s been a while since we had one of them and we’ve worked hard at being resilient. We wanted to be better on the ball, but we weren’t.

“I wasn’t happy with the way we played in the first half. Gillingham will always make chances and our goalkeeper kept us in it with a couple of great saves.

“We fluffed our lines a little bit in the first half. We didn’t pass it well, we didn’t retain possession as well as I’d have liked us to, and we didn’t probe or rotate the ball quickly.

“I thought we got stronger in the game as it went on. We were a lot better in the second half and we had a 15-minute spell where we should have scored.

“We had a nightmare trip yesterday – the coach broke down before we left, and then we caught traffic, so we only got here at 10.15pm.

"But I told the players that they shouldn’t use that as an excuse. If you’re using an excuse before you’ve started it’s a sign of weakness.”