Gillingham’s Jonny Williams said he was lucky to come off the pitch injury-free at Barrow after a shocking early tackle.

Cole Stockton’s fourth-minute lunge took the Gillingham player out but referee Scott Tallis - who had a great view of the challenge - decided to issue a yellow card rather than a red.

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To Williams’ dismay, Stockton not only stayed on but turned in a top performance against the Gills as Barrow won the game 2-0.

Reacting to the challenge, Williams said: “I am lucky I have come off the pitch injury-free.

“In this league, you can be on the end of some bad tackles, and that was a really bad one. I landed on my neck and to be honest, I thought it was a clear red card, but we haven’t had that decision.

“Had we had that decision it is a different game, he was their best player by a country mile and sometimes we need those decisions to go our way.”

Williams was on the end of some heavy challenges all night and said: “In this league, you do need the officials to be on your side and protect you because they will keep coming and keep fouling you and leaving tackles on you, you do need that and we didn’t get it.”

The Gills looked tired on the night and turned in a flat performance against a team clearly fired up after a fortnight off and determined to end a run of three straight losses.

“The changing room was really disappointed,” he said. “We have belief now off the back of a few good results that we could get three points but we haven’t and to be honest the better side probably won, which is hard to say, but we have been beaten by the better side.

“It was hard, they were clever, they let us have the ball at the back and we probably weren’t quick enough moving the ball over the pitch and we weren’t at our best on the night.

“We are still there or thereabouts, we have to keep going, we have 10 cup finals now and we need to give our all and see where we end up.”

It’s lowly Tranmere Rovers at home next this Saturday.

Williams said: “We haven’t got time to feel sorry for ourselves, we still feel we’re in the promotion pack chasing a play-off position.

“We have another big week coming up and massive thanks to the fans who travelled all that way which is exceptional and we are thankful for and sorry we couldn’t give them more.”