Neil Harris says recruitment is the hardest part of management as he tries to get his final signing over the line.

The Gillingham boss wants to add a defender to his squad before the transfer window closes at 11pm next Thursday.

Once again he thought he was close before the Gills’ midweek penalty shoot-out victory over Exeter in the Carabao Cup but the chase goes on.

Deals can fall through at the last minute for any number of reasons, with Harris spending up to six hours a day trying to bring the right man to Priestfield.

“It’s a magnitude of things,” said Harris.

“A player gets cold feet, I get cold feet, an agent doesn’t get enough money out of it, an injury, a development where somebody else comes into the fold who might be in a better league than you or wants to offer more money or just shows an interest and they want to explore it.

“So straight away I’ve given you a list or five or six things and then putting them all in the mix that might happen at the same time, then it becomes from definitely being done to very unlikely and then that can change again in one phone call.

“That in a nutshell has been my life for the last four months, and (at the same time) you prepare a team and try and win games of football.

“I have to get the balance right. My focus has to be, and is, winning games of football, making sure the training’s correct and we’re in a good place for that.

“However, I need my squad for the whole season, certainly from transfer window to transfer window, so I think how much time I actually spend in a day, it can go from six hours in one day just trying to sign one player, to nothing for a couple of days if it all goes quiet.

“Recruitment is the hardest bit of the job.

“I find managing a group easy because I can just be myself, always honest, everyone knows where they stand.

“Training-wise, we prepare diligently and we’re organised and we’re structured so we’re in a good place with that.

“Trying to get the recruitment, that is the hard part because it’s so unpredictable.”

Harris isn’t expecting any departures from Gillingham in the final week of the window but he’s been around long enough to know anything can happen.

He said: “Everyone at the moment knows their value to the group and I don’t want to lose anybody but in the transfer window nothing’s a surprise.

“You can be really settled and look like you’re done and then out the blue, someone comes in to take one of your players, the player wants to go and you have to replace them.

“So I’d never rule anything out but at the moment we’re just looking for a defender.”