Gareth Ainsworth saw his Gillingham side well beaten by York City at the weekend and he wants his team to learn lessons from the defeat.

He lost two players to injury in the first half and then saw substitute Zane Albarus sent off for a second yellow card.

Speaking after the game to the official site, Ainsworth said: “We are 1-0 at ten men, and I thought that we were in the game. Coming up here, teams are going to struggle. They’re a very good form side at home, and we were hoping to nick something.

“We changed the shape to be more attacking because I thought that was the time that York had just turned on us a little bit, and we were getting a lot of pressure, so I changed the shape, and then we got a man sent off.

“My best laid plans go to waste, as the saying goes. The boys tried, but away at York, with ten men on this big pitch and them in the ascendancy, it was always going to be tough.

“To be fair, the goals are not great goals for us. We conceded some bad goals there. There are a couple of fundamental errors in some of them. At the end of the day, we have to take it on the chin.”

Ainsworth is keen to learn the lessons from the defeat for both the players and himself.

He added: “I am so grounded. We have lost, but there are a few lessons learned… I have a young squad, and we have legs, but we need nous as well. For me, we were second best today. We have to get back, look through that, and put it right, but more importantly, put a good performance on against Newport at home because that is a game that we want to win.

“I apologise that we haven’t given them anything to shout about (the supporters). Obviously, we all do it with honesty and hard work. Nobody goes out there meaning to do anything negative. The players will learn. There are some young boys in that team at the end, and I think that there were one or two mistakes that were made for the goals and things like that. They will learn from that, and that is a positive.

“I will have a look at myself and think, could I have done any better? I picked a team that got beat, so maybe picking a different team would have been the thing, but you don’t expect the injuries and the sending off. That does hamper you somewhat.”

Both Eli King and Will Goodwin came off in the first half with injuries and the manager is hopeful that neither of them are serious.

He said: “Losing Eli King and Will Goodwin again after 15 minutes is not good. For Eli, it is a twist with no one near him, and that can be concerning for somebody who has had a knee injury before. We will have a look at that. He was not on crutches and was walking over and clapping the fans, which is positive.

Will, we need to make sure that we keep this boy fit because the platform that we had up front just went.”