Gillingham boss Steve Evans hopes to have at least one more player signed before next week's transfer deadline.

Deals between EFL and Premier League clubs for contracted players can continue until Friday and Evans has his eye on one more target.

The Gills have already made 15 signings during the current window but Evans did only have a handful of players reporting back for pre-season.

“Certainly nobody will be going out of the main group, the chairman has made that absolutely clear.” Evans said, having already spoken of interest in defender Connor Ogilvie.

“We may try and do one bit of business for sure and the chairman is happy to do it. In terms of cost he has to weigh it up. If it works I would love to do it.

“He is looking through some numbers this weekend with the finance lady. The one thing I know he wants to help me, he wants me to have that other player that makes us, in my opinion better.

“Whether the numbers stack, he decides.”

The Gills boss has a 22-man squad, excluding season-long injury victim Stuart O’Keefe . He’s been without a handful of midfielders but they are due back soon.

Kyle Dempsey, Matty Willock and Scott Robertson are all pushing for a return. Southampton loan player Tom O’Connor will be back from international duty for next weekend's game against MK Dons.

With six loan players on the books already he’ll be looking for a permanent addition. Only five loanees can be named in a matchday squad.

Evans has so far put together a competitive squad on limited resources. They sit fourth in the League 1 table. Oxford United were the visitors on Saturday and a couple of their players were ones he looked at during the summer but was unable to act due to finances.

He spoke before Saturday’s match about the interest in former Hearts midfielder Sean Clare - who Oxford are now playing at right-back - and their striker Matty Taylor.

Evans said: “I tried to speak to Hearts (about Clare) and went to Taylor’s agent in the summer. He said he was going to Oxford unless we could come up with a package which we couldn’t afford to do as a club.

“We have the resources our chairman is comfortably in paying, what we can afford, and we just have to work hard and see where it takes us.

“We’ve got what we’ve got and they are giving us everything. If teams beat us they will have to work as hard as we do.”

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