Gillingham manager Mark Bonner was delighted with the commitment levels from his players as they claimed maximum points on Saturday.

Jayden Clarke scored the crucial goal in a 1-0 win, with his strike coming early in the second half.

Report: Gillingham 1 Salford 0

In tough weather conditions, and following back-to-back defeats where they faced pointed criticism from fans and their own manager, it was a test of character for the Gills.

Bonner said: “It was always going to be a really tough game. Maybe because of the moment we were in a little bit. Also, the conditions obviously were not great.

“It was a hard game to be full flow in and everything else. We tried to make ourselves a really competitive, stubborn team.

“The way we played isn't necessarily entertaining and isn't all guns blazing, go and chase everything. We had a way in which we wanted to try and set the game up.

“We changed the shape, we made loads of changes to the starting team and the squad overall and needed some reaction from Wednesday, which we got.

“I really liked the commitment of the team and when you've got 26 games left, or whatever it is, I think you just look at that and say ‘that is your minimum level that you expect to see’ and the players know that. It's a good reminder to them and to us and to everybody else.

“We come out of the game with a really important result on a day against a team that are going very well, where we're very up and down and having some horrible moments and under the cosh a little bit.

“We take three points from a really committed performance and over the last four games we've been really up and down, but we've taken two wins from four now and while we're trying to work out and work through the period that we're in, we have to find a way of just keep getting results.

“Sometimes that will be ugly wins and sometimes that might be good ones. Sometimes it's going to need getting some points out of games that we can't win or don't do well enough in to win, because we want to try and stack some results together.”

Clarke’s 48th-minute effort against Salford was followed by another where he had the ball in the net but was flagged for offside.

The forward was also tripped in the box, an incident most inside Priestfield felt was worthy of a penalty. It wasn’t given.

Bonner said: “In fairness, after the first goal, what a brilliant attack the next one was. Jayden's just offside.

“I haven't seen (the penalty incident) back. Everyone that has tells me I was absolutely right, that we felt it was a penalty in the first half on Jayden, which obviously would have helped us in the game as well.

“But well done to him again, another goal, a really good start to the second half.”

The Gills were booed off the pitch last time out at Priestfield, having lost to Harrogate. There were cheers again as the Gills worked hard for this win.

Bonner said: “Who doesn't want to see their team fighting and giving everything? That's the minimum, it's the minimum for this club, it's the minimum for supporters to turn up and see that.

“I was very strict that there's no fist pumps at the end of that game, because ‘have some humility, we've won a game. Get off the pitch and take your applause’.

“However that game turns out, when you give that and you fight and you see how many bodies are protecting our goal and our box and how hard people are working in the game, you'll always get applauded off the pitch by the majority of fans, because they expect that from the team. We should expect that from each other all the time.

“There's lots of individuals that could deserve amazing effort. I think in the two games we played this week, two midfield players Robbie (McKenzie) and Ethan (Coleman) have covered so much ground, won so many tackles, won so much ball.

“In the games that haven't been nice on the eye in fluid football games, they've given everything. Elliot Nevitt’s work ethic was just amazing and his competitiveness was great. There's others within that as well.

“Cat’s (Glenn Morris) made big saves, defenders have defended properly. It's just a real minimum of what we want to be and if you have that as a foundation you can build on that quite quickly.”