Joe Pigott will be one player Gillingham need to keep a close eye on this weekend.

The striker struggled to make an impression with the Gills during a brief loan period in the second part of the 2013/14 season under Peter Taylor.

But he’s been a hit with AFC Wimbledon since making the switch from non-league Maidstone United.

He joined the Dons in January 2018 after scoring regularly for the Stones during the first half of that campaign.

This season he’s got 13 goals for a struggling team and has been key to their recent revival, scoring the winner against Southend last weekend and netting the only goal of the game to see off Peterborough in the match before that.

It was Pigott who scored the solitary goal at Priestfield back in September when the Dons walked away with three points.

Gills boss Steve Lovell knows Pigott well, having coached him at Charlton’s academy.

He said: “I know what kind of player he is, he is always likely to get a goal and like most centre forwards you play against in this league, the ones scoring goals are the ones you need to take care of.

“Technically he is very good, I have seen him score some brilliant goals when he was at Maidstone.”

While Pigott is a threat, Lovell will be buoyed with how his team handled League 1’s most lethal forward line at Luton. They drew that game 2-2.

“We dealt with them quite well, apart from the first goal,” Lovell said.

“Callum Reilly’s misjudged the ball which looped back towards their fella (and he scored).

“(Wimbledon’s front) two are in a hard-working team. They are a young team with plenty of energy.”

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