Dale Gorman says his shooting drills on the training pitch paid off with his first goal for Stevenage on Saturday.

The 20-year-old scored the opener in a 2-1 win at Barnet, a fine curled effort from 20 yards following a lay-off from Matt Godden.

Gorman has made the left wing position his own in recent months and the match at The Hive was his 15th of the campaign, and his 29th for the club over the past two seasons.

The Northern Irish youth international says playing more has increased his confidence to do things like his shot at the weekend, an effort he may not necessarily have tried last year when he broke into the team.

“I think when you [first] come in you’re trying to impress and the more you play the more confident you get,” Gorman said.

“Maybe last year I wouldn’t have taken that shot on but obviously it just fell to me and I thought ‘why not?’

“I’ve been practising a lot in training, doing shooting drills because I hadn’t scored yet.

“The gaffer pulled me aside [Friday] and said ‘listen, you don’t have that bendy one’ so I thought alright, fair enough. And luckily it came to me and I bent it and it went in.”

Gorman also praised striker Godden for his part in the goal, and his ability to bring others into play.

“Matty is brilliant. He’s one of those players who you can give the ball and trust him,” Gorman said.

“He’s got that vision. He does that every day in training. I was fully confident he would lay the ball off.

“Since he’s come into the club he’s been a massive boost to us and been really, really good. He gives us that bit extra. Rowan [Liburd] coming into the team, he was brilliant [as well] and I thought they linked up really well.”