By Luke Cawdell

Gillingham boss Andy Hessenthaler admitted that hopes of promotion this season are a long way off following another disaster on the road.

A month after conceding five goals at Bury the Gills shipped seven at Accrington on Saturday to leave their early season hopes in disarray.

Following the 7-4 defeat, Hessenthaler (pictured) said: "It’s another game where we’ve come away from home, scored four goals and lost.

"Things have got to change otherwise we can forget about promotion this year without a doubt because on that performance we are nowhere near it."

The Gills went into the season looking to bounce back into League 1 at the first attempt but have so far experienced a stop-start campaign – Saturday’s defeat left them 18th in the table.

"At the moment we can forget about finishing in the top three, we need to start concentrating on performing week in, week out," said Hessenthaler.

"We’ve had a couple of games where we defended well but if we then have a couple of games like that (at Accrington) we’ll achieve nothing this year."

What do Gillingham need to do to stop these heavy away defeats? Have your say below.