Confident Fleetwood is still after Town hat-trick

He is still searching for his first Hatters hat-trick though after seeing his late chip graze the bar.

That confidence has helped the 26-year-old though, as he said: “Even if it’s subconsciously. Even that last chance where I hit the crossbar, I probably wouldn’t have tried that if I hadn’t have scored at the start of this season. The confidence does start to flow and you start to go on instinct.

“I think once you’ve scored twice, and we knew the game was won by then, you can try those sort of things.

“I thought it might have looped in, but unluckily it hit the bar, and the hat-trick, I’m still waiting to try and get that.”

Both of Fleetwood’s first half goals were superb finishes, his first rounding off a lovely team move and his second, a 25-yard curler, filled with individual brilliance. On his sublime strikes, he continued: “I’m very happy. The manager told me from the start of the game to stay high, so I’ve let the two big men take the challenges for me and try and get in behind and score goals.

“The first one was a great pass from JJ (O’Donnell). I think Jon Shaw was waiting for a tap in, but I saw that the keeper had shown me a bit too much space at his near post so I managed to slip it through his legs.

“The second one I’m very happy with and bent it in from the edge of the box.

“Me and Mark Tyler always joke about it in training because I always seem to do it a lot in training.

“I’m not one of those players who goes and lashes the ball as hard as he can, I always try and side-foot things.

“From that position I know the keeper can’t see from behind the defender, so I know that if I get it close enough to that inside post it’s got a chance and it zipped up off the surface and hit the inside netting.

“It was instinct, I just shifted it and hit it. When you are on form they go in as well, so you need a little bit of luck.

“It’s a good start but I’m not going to get ahead of myself.

“Fortunately I’ve been in this position before where I’ve scored a lot of goals in this league so I know how to deal with that.”

Fleetwood is one of the early pacesetters in the division’s golden boot stakes, but is refusing to get carried away. “I’m only two games in, I’m not going to go over the top,” he added.

“I know there are a lot of great strikers in this league.

“One of our old boys, Aaron O’Connor is on three now as well.

“There’s a lot of good teams in this league, but with the strikers we’ve got here, I couldn’t care less if I only scored three for the rest of the season so long as we get promoted.

“It’s that kind of team this year, everyone is working towards the same goal, if I score the goals, so be it.”

Boss Paul Buckle admitted it had been a very difficult call whether to start with Fleetwood or go with Andre Gray on the night.

He said: “It was a tough decision. Do you play Fleetwood or do you play Gray up there? Because Gray’s an outstanding player as well.

“I went for Fleets because he made one and scored one, but wasn’t at it on Saturday in my opinion either.

“I had a long chat with him before the game at the hotel and asked him if he still believed?

“I asked him if he still believed he could get in behind defenders and play on the shoulder and be the player that he’s been at Forest Green, that’s why everybody went and took him.

“He’s done that. He’s got in between and JJ has played a great ball through which is what he’s got to do.

“There’s no point in him showing to feet. We’ve got (Scott) Rendell who can do that and (Jon) Shaw.

“He’s the one that needs to get in behind and when he does that he looks a proper player.

“Basically it’s not enough to be scoring a goal here and there.

“He’s got to do a job for the team and he’s done that.”

Surrounded by the likes of Shaw, Gray and Rendell the Hatters now possess real firepower, but Fleetwood doesn’t believe that removes the onus from him.

He added: “I’ve always backed myself to score goals and I knew that’s why I was brought here in the first place.

“It’s always nice to have other players that can score goals as well, so you don’t think the pressure’s too much on you.

“But whether I was the only striker here or not, or one of seven or eight, it doesn’t make any difference.

“I want to be the top goalscorer here, I want to be the one scoring the goals and I’m never going to change that.

“Jon set me up for my second goal and I set him up on Saturday.

“It’s not a selfish thing, we all want each other to score and do well and ultimately the team wins when that happens.”

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