MARLON KING is ready to hand Gillingham a welcome boost by returning sooner rather than later from long-term injury.

Such has been the striker’s progress since tearing cruciate ligaments at Derby in January, that optimism is growing within the club that he could be ready for the trip to Bradford City on August 23.

The club are reluctant to fix a date for their former top scorer’s long-awaited comeback but it could be in two to three weeks.

Speaking after Saturday's 2-0 win at Dover in a pre-season friendly, coach Wayne Jones disclosed: “Marlon is raring to go.

“He’s going to see the specialist on Monday (today) and if he gets the go-ahead, as we all feel he will, then he’ll be back in training with the rest of the players.

“But there's a difference being in training and being match fit. So you could be looking at another couple of weeks for him which would be a good thing.”

Player-manager Andy Hessenthaler’s attempts to bed down his squad in time for next Saturday's big kick-off against Sheffield United at Bramall Lane was hit by the absence of six players at Dover.

Of those six, only centre-back Barry Ashby, who missed the game with a back spasm, and Tommy Johnson (groin) have any chance of facing Neil Warnock’s fancied United.

“We’ll see how they are on Wednesday,” said Jones. “If neither are ready by then we cannot put them in the squad to go to Sheffield.

“We would love to be in a situation whereby the majority of first team regulars are fit and competing for those 11 places. We’ve not had that since the beginning of last season.

"”We’ve always been restricted in the number of strikers we've had available by injuries. We just hope that this season will not be a repeat of last.”

Unless Hessenthaler decides to upgrade tonight’s friendly at Billericay to a first team fixture, Saturday’s match at Dover was the last in the club’s pre-season preparation.

Jones added: “We were pleased with Saturday’s performance but you had to take into consideration the conditions which were steaming hot with temperatures in the 80s. The grass was very long and dry so it took a lot of work to get the boys to pass the ball quick and get it forward.

“We were satisfied overall because we felt we created chances while at the other end I don’t think they had an out and out chance. We would certainly settle for a 2-0 win at Sheffield United next Saturday.

“We were pleased to see Big Mama on the scoresheet but he should really be scoring more goals with his head and we’ve been working on that in training to improve that.”