Lee Johnson won his first game as Barnsley manager as the Reds got a 1-0 victory over Gillingham on Kent on Saturday.

George Waring scored the only goal of the match early in the second half to lift Barnsley up four places to 12th in League One and make it three wins in a row without conceding. They are still four points behind the play-offs places but now are nine clear of the bottom four. 

The new manager made two changes from the win at Scunthorpe on Tuesday under caretaker boss Mark Burton. The suspended Jean Yves M'voto was replaced by Mason Holgate while Milan Lalkovic came in for James Bailey.

Very little happened in the first half as the sides tried to play passing football on a heavy pitch in wet and windy conditions. Barnsley had a succession of long-range shots but the only one on target, by Lalkovic, was easily saved by goalkeeper Stuart Nelson. Gillingham also missed from outside the box while Lewin Nyatanga deflected a John Marquis header into the arms of Adam Davies. Josh Scowen, who got the winner at Scunthorpe, was played through by John O'Sullivan on the stroke of half-time but fired well over from a fairly tight angle from 15 yards out on the right. 

The Reds took the lead 11 minutes into the second half when Ben Pearson's shot was saved by Nelson but Waring tapped in the rebound.  Gillingham almost levelled within a minute as Davies made a good save from Gavin Hoyte's shot then Jermaine McGlashan blazed the rebound over the empty net from three yards out but was spared embarrassment by the linesman's offside decision. 

The home side were then restricted to a couple of long-range efforts which missed the target while it was Barnsley who came close to a second goal as John O'Sullivan's excellent 20-yard effort was clawed out of the top right corner on 87 minutes. 

Gillingham had a golden chance to level in injury-time when McGlashan was put clean through but Davies made a fine save with his legs.