{"id":542129,"date":"2020-01-30T13:38:42","date_gmt":"2020-01-30T18:38:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonfootball.com\/?p=542129"},"modified":"2020-01-30T13:38:42","modified_gmt":"2020-01-30T18:38:42","slug":"lee-hodson-departs-gillingham-on-loan-for-st-mirren","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/01\/30\/lee-hodson-departs-gillingham-on-loan-for-st-mirren\/","title":{"rendered":"Lee Hodson Departs Gillingham on Loan for St Mirren"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonfootball.com\/category\/league-football\/league12\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gillingham<\/a> have confirmed the departure of defender Lee Hodson. The full-back joins Scottish side St Mirren on loan for the rest of the season, completing a return to the club where he spent the 2018\/19 season.<\/p>\n<h2>Lee Hodson Departs Gillingham for St Mirren<\/h2>\n<h3>The Deal<\/h3>\n<p>Gillingham announced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gillinghamfootballclub.com\/news\/2020\/january\/hodson-joins-st-mirren\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via their website<\/a> they had let the defender leave. Hodson joins St Mirren on loan for the rest of the season, tasked with ensuring their safety in the Scottish Premiership.<\/p>\n<p>The former <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonfootball.com\/clubs\/watford\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Watford<\/a> and Rangers defender has struggled for game time this season, making just 12 appearances for the Gills. He returns to St Mirren following a successful loan spell with the Buddies last season.<\/p>\n<p>Hodson joined Gillingham in the summer but has struggled to oust veteran Barry Fuller who has excelled this season. He wants regular game time as he targets a place in the Northern Ireland squad.<\/p>\n<h3>What Was Said<\/h3>\n<p>Speaking to the Gillingham website about letting Hodson depart, manager <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gillinghamfootballclub.com\/news\/2020\/january\/hodson-joins-st-mirren\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Steve Evans said:<\/a> \u201cLee is a top-class lad and, as important, a very good player.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;However, Barry Fuller has been very good, and we have several players who can play in that position if needed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;In fairness, Lee wants to play football and I presented him with three SPL options and two in League 1 and out of those he has chosen St Mirren, an excellent club with a brilliant dedicated support base. He did very well there previously so we all wish him success, one lad who deserves it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>A Chance to Impress for Hodson<\/h3>\n<p>Hodson returns to St Mirren where he really connected with the club after helping them survive relegation last season.<\/p>\n<p>He will hope his performances impress both his parent club and country over the next few months. Steve Evans rates him highly so certainly he will be keeping an eye out.<\/p>\n<p>Hodson\u2019s focus now shifts to St Mirren staying in the Scottish Premiership.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"qVHFspzPQCZYcYNAE9HAZg\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/614091478\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'qVHFspzPQCZYcYNAE9HAZg',sig:'cYtWv3VUcjM2tZIQCr8iE_PphPgbkqbIz9s_Lf7SXwQ=',w:'594px',h:'408px',items:'614091478',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gillingham have confirmed the departure of defender Lee Hodson. The full-back joins Scottish side St Mirren on loan for the rest of the season, completing a return to the club where he spent the 2018\/19 season. Lee Hodson Departs Gillingham for St Mirren The Deal Gillingham announced via their website they had let the defender [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3241,"featured_media":542137,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"1580410800","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[34,32,30,28],"tags":[47,188,4781,2054,136],"class_list":["post-542129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-league12","category-league-football","category-news","category-transfers","tag-gillingham","tag-league-one","tag-lee-hodson","tag-st-mirren","tag-world-football"],"modified_by":"Nat Goodlad, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3241"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}