Stuart Nelson apologised to his team-mates after letting in an injury-time equaliser against Port Vale.

The ball span away from his grasp into the bottom corner at Priestfield.

Boss Peter Taylor was disappointed to see his team’s lead blown but Nelson’s apology was enough.

“The players probably feel like they have lost the game but they were rallying around Nelson, which is good,” said the Gills boss.

“Everyone makes a mistake in matches and when you are a goalkeeper it is more noticed unfortunately.

“Stuart held his hands up to say he should have stopped it. I think the ball might have been spinning, it got deflected. In some ways that made it more of a problem to deal with.

“That’s the problem being a goalkeeper. You are infront of that white line and if you make a mistake it goes in.

“Stuart would normally stop them easily. The players were very down because of it and you can understand why.

"There weren’t many things said from me (afterwards). It was a case of, ‘we’ll carry on, we’ve got another point and we are on a better run than we were four matches ago’. We have to keep going.”

Gillingham went a goal down in the match before a John Egan double put them 2-1 up.

Vale hit the woodwork twice towards the end and it was Michael Brown’s shot which deceived Nelson at the death.

“I’m disappointed because I thought we had done enough to win the match,” said Taylor.

“I felt we had a chance to get a third goal, we created some good chances second half, but we didn’t take enough of them and that’s why it was always a nervy finish but in that nervous finish there was a goal that we wouldn’t normally concede.

“We’re hanging on right at the end because we are desperate to get the three points.”

Visiting keeper Chris Neal had been in top form, with his shot-stopping, to frustrate the Gills often.

“I know both teams had good spells in the game but I felt we created more chances,” said the Gills manager.

“I know there was the Colin Daniel one at the end (which hit the post) and it was a bit hairy at times but at the start of the second half we should have scored more. We were in a couple of times. Eventually we got a goal from a corner but I felt we should have scored from open play before that.”