Gillingham’s loan midfielder Jordan Houghton looks set to return to Premier League Chelsea.

His current loan deal expires on January 3 and the Gills wanted to extend that despite the youngster seeing little action of late.

Chelsea, however, are keen for him to return after he failed to play in Gillingham’s last nine games.

He has not been in the last two matchday squads for the League 1 high-flyers and boss Justin Edinburgh admitted on Monday that the 20-year-old is now likely to return to Stamford Bridge.

Edinburgh said: “It looks like he will go back there.

“He hasn’t played as much football as they would have wanted from his loan but we spoke at length about it and we understand it.”

Houghton was a regular for the Gills at the start of the season but has started just one league game since the start of October and hasn’t played at all since the FA Cup defeat at Stevenage.

His spell at Gillingham was the first in men’s competitive football for Chelsea’s under-21 skipper and he will leave having played 15 games and netting his first senior goal, in a 5-1 win over Fleetwood.