Gillingham chairman Paul Scaly is ruling nothing out this season.

He’s been impressed with the squad that manager Steve Lovell has assembled and believes they are capable of promotion.

Speaking ahead of their season opener at Accrington, he said: “I hope the manager knows what team he is going to play because I wouldn’t know what team to pick at the moment.

"They have all been playing pretty well and that’s a nice position for him to be in. This is a big season for the club.

“I think this team is capable of promotion, but of course we have learnt in football not to make predictions.

“We start off every season with the three same objectives, one is to stay in this division, one is to get into the play-offs and one is to try and get promotion and those three objectives remain season on season. We will fight to achieve all three of those if we can.

“I think we need to have a reasonable start, be steady, be patient, not panic and stick to what we believe in and build on that. When we start to lose sight of what we believe in we are in trouble.”

Mr Scally, approaching his 24th season at the helm, remains committed to seeking investment off the pitch, to help the team on it and also realise his ambition of overseeing a new stadium.

He said: “It was a tough year last year, changing management is always difficult. Steve has got players around him that he believes in, that he can trust and from what I have seen in some of the pre-season games all of the signings he has made are very interesting, they bring something different.

“I think we have a squad now that is fairly well balanced, with competition for places all across the field.”

Asked where he gets his drive from, year on year, he said: “It is in that belief that this club can go on and be better. Once I stop believing that and start believing I can’t go any further, that is the time to go, but I have spent an awful lot of time in the last 18 months, looking around the world, talking to (potential) sponsors and investors, people who can come in and make a difference to the team in the short term and the club in the longer term.

“My biggest challenge is to try and bring one of the investors home, get the investment to take the team forward into the Championship and do the new stadium, because I think the two go hand in hand.”

One sponsor who is already onboard is Ticket Co, who have their name on the white and yellow change strip this season.

Mr Scally is negotiating a deal to get them to implement the e-ticketing system at the stadium that should make life easier for the fans. The chairman hopes to have that in place by mid-September, for the visit of Peterborough on the 20th.

“We are very close,” he said, prior to heading for Accrington.

“Hopefully early part of next week I will be signing (the contract) and then we will be looking at the implementation.

“What it will allow fans to do is save on having to come and buy tickets, getting them posted, they can go online, they can print them, they can put them on their phones, turn up with a QR card and scan on the entrance, easy as pi.”

Asked about the arrival of the new replica shirts, he is expecting them to be in the club shop before the home game against Burton Albion, next Saturday.

“We had a slight problem with transportation from Sri Lanka (where they are manufactured),” he said.

“It was not our problem I might add, but I think the shirts are trickling in and I think they will be in stock by the end of next week. We have had some flown over the rest are somewhere between Sri Lanka and here, somewhere near Italy.

“I think the kits are lovely and I love the fact that we have replicated the 125th year old kit (a black and white striped shirt) that our predecessors wore all those years ago, that is quite nice. I thought it looked stunning.”

The Gills kick off their League 1 campaign against Accrington on Saturday.

Read all about Gills' first league game in Monday's Medway Messenger, with reaction and report from Accrington.