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Gillingham manager Mark Bonner admits there’s “lots to admire” about weekend opponents MK Dons whose winning run they’ll be trying to end.
The Dons - managed by former Gills player and ex-Chatham Town boss Scott Lindsey - have won their last six games games in League 2 to surge up the table.
Gillingham are buoyed by a win of their own, beating Salford City at home last weekend, but the Dons are flying under Lindsey. He took over an MK side 19th in League 2 and they now sit seventh.
Bonner said: “If you could pair a manager with a team, it's probably the perfect pairing. Scott's gone in and the run of form since he's been there has been excellent.
“They are the form team. I think anyone who finishes above them will get promoted because I do think they'll be right at the top of it and I think they'll strengthen again in January and only get better and stronger as they go.
“(They are) certainly one of the favourites and one of the strongest teams (in the division). The identity that they've got is really paired nicely with the manager and he maybe hasn't really got all of the squad that he'll want yet.
“There's a good fight there for people trying to be part of it. But they're in good form, scoring lots of goals.
“A possession-based team, direct threats, good runners in the team. (Aaron) Nemane, right wing-back, a really creative one. Alex Gilbey's on flames at the moment in terms of forward runs and scoring goals. Scott Hogan's an excellent centre-forward with real pedigree that's done great for them.
“They've got a number of options with (Liam) Kelly and (Laurence) Maguire who got promoted with Scott at Crawley last year that can understand his way quite quickly.
“I think there's lots to admire about their team, lots to be mindful of in our game against them, but also areas where we feel like if we're brilliant we can cause them problems too.
League 2 table
“It'll be an interesting challenge. The game will look very different, I'm sure, to the one that was here last weekend. That's just the nature of it.
“It's a huge pitch, but it's a huge pitch for them too when we've got the ball. So how good we are with it and how well we retain possession, sustain attacks and have them running is really important.
“If we try to do it the other way round and constantly just be happy without the ball and giving it back all the time, too long an afternoon, too long a task to try and face that out. We've got to go and have a right go at being good with the ball.
“We've got to find the good moments to go and press and be really aggressive and in the moments when we haven't got control of the game, or they've got us deep in the pitch, we have to defend brilliantly. It's probably a combination of everything.
“It will be a thinking game, a talking game, a running game and we'll have to do that really well.”
At the level, the challenges don’t get much harder.
Bonner said: “Certain games or styles test you in different ways. Certain atmospheres test you in different ways.
“It's a huge pitch and a really nice playing surface. It's a beautiful stadium. So that side of it, it's quite motivational to turn up to.
“It's not necessarily the most intimidating in terms of atmospheres, but whereas others give you that challenge that this one doesn't give you, you are playing against a team that can hurt you in so many different ways and have real threats in their game, that's what makes it a tough challenge, plus the form that they're on.
“It's certainly a tough one, but we're a little bit buoyed by last weekend's result and hopefully that's something that we can build on.”
