Alan Julian helped Gillingham to a much-needed clean sheet on Saturday after pulling off a save that his goalkeeping hero would have been proud of.

Just hours after hailing the qualities of Peter Schmeichel to his team-mates, the Gills keeper denied striker Marc Richards from stealing the points with a spread-eagled save that the former Manchester United keeper was renowned for.

Julian said: "When Richards came in I just thought I have to make myself as big as possible.

"Funnily enough, I don’t know whether it had anything to do with it, but we were talking about our best World XI of all time on the way in and I went for Schmeichel in goal.

"He used to make many saves like that himself and I just managed to make myself as big as possible and that was it.

"I watch football all of the time and you do learn things. You learn bits and pieces and I’ve learned off him."

It was one of only a few brief moments where Port Vale troubled Julian and he couldn’t praise the Gillingham defence enough.

"I thought the boys in front of me were fantastic," he said.

"That was pretty much the only save I had to make and credit must go to them."