Having already spoken with assistant manager Gav Skelton about the confidence the group will have taken from the last two results it stood to reason that his response would be similar when it came to considering the impact it has on everybody to see the forwards putting the ball in the back of the net.
“It does have that impact, and confidence is a funny thing,” he said. “Some people need lots of confidence and others just need a little bit.
“When you’re scoring goals, and getting positive results, it’s natural to go into games with a better feeling. When you score goals you go into the next game believing you can score more, which always helps.
“Obviously scoring goals is what all strikers want to do, so it does them no harm at all. Only goals and working hard will give you that.
“When we had that little spell where we weren’t scoring it was a concern, obviously, but I feel we can be still better in those attacking areas and create more opportunities.
“But there’s no getting away from the fact that two positive results, and scoring two goals in both games, is bound to give the group and squad belief.”
“It is a really pleasing thing that we saw Joe Garner and Sean Maguire get their goals. We’ve got good choices up front and that will be interesting, to see who keeps it up and performs for us.
“We’ve had an evolution of strikers so things take time, you try to do stuff in training, but you can’t replicate a game.
“We’ve started to see relationships with Terry Ablade and Joe Garner when they’ve come on, which is good. They complement each other well so it’s something I hope we see more of in the next couple of weeks.”
With every player chomping at the bit to be involved there’s also the encouraging scenario that everyone is determined to do their bit.
“It is pleasing when you see lads who haven’t started coming on and contributing,” he agreed. “As a player it’s all about a Saturday afternoon, and sometimes it is difficult to take when you aren’t playing.
“The manager keeps saying it’s a squad game, we used lots of players last year and we’re only into September at the moment.
“It is frustrating because they all want to play on a Saturday, it’s easy to tell them to be patient and I’ve been there myself and it is frustrating. We will need them all and whoever comes on I think they are contributing, which is what we’re going to need.
“It would be strange if you weren’t frustrated if you aren’t playing, but it’s important for them to take that frustration out in the right way by making sure they affect the game when they get onto the pitch.
“If they get the hump it’s normal for them to maybe not speak to me or the gaffer for 24 hours, but to make sure you help your team mates is the important thing.
“At the moment we’ve got the starters and the players coming on who are impacting it, but even the ones who aren’t making the squad are contributing.
“They’re doing extra hours and training while we’re away and things like that, and that in turn pushes the lads who are in the squad to make sure they stay in it.
“Those lads don’t get the pats on the back on a Saturday if we get a positive result, but they’re all working hard and we appreciate all of their effort.”
And with the transfer window now well and truly done it means that the focus can be on the squad for at least the four months.
“It probably doesn’t affect me as much as the manager and Greg, but it is nice to know who we’ve got in the building,” he commented. “It’s constant during the whole window, and when you speak to staff at other clubs it’s crazy that it always comes down to the last week when everyone has had months to do it.
“It’s the same for every single club, so the calmness and steadiness we’ve got now should help us. We’ve got a good group of players with good options which will take us through to the next window, where we’ll look to improve again.”
