Billy Barr wants Rovers to use their Premier League 2 league leaders tag as a driving force in the remaining games.

The Under-23s topped the pile for a second time this season after another impressive victory on the road, their 3-1 victory at Leicester City stretching their unbeaten away record to seven games.

After an impressive performance at Manchester City the week before, that ended 1-1, Rovers were too strong for the Foxes courtesy of goals from Jack Vale, Joe Nolan and Bradley Dack.

They travel to Manchester United on Friday night in what their busiest period of the season, with Barr keen to see the progress continue.

Asked what being top of the league mean, Barr said: “Nothing, but it’s nice for the lads, it really is. If it’s something that makes them perform even better then great.

“My job is to keep them performing as they’re doing now.

“As a group they’re evolving nicely, we’ve gone to another higher league teams’ Under-23s and had more possession, so that’s two weeks on the trot.

“By the end of this week we’ll have played three of the top four in the English Premier League in our last three games and if we can perform like we have in the last two, fantastic, and they’re the demands we’ll be putting on them going into the next game. And we’ll be a lot younger than we were on Monday night.”

Rovers have now won five and drawn two of their seven away matches in Premier League 2.

They are a point clear of Spurs at the top having played a game less, and three clear of Man City who have a game in hand. Their excellent away form has been key to their fine season, and they should have beaten City last time out having dominated the game, only to be held to a 1-1 draw.

And Barr added: “One of the players referenced it after we’d had our debrief, he said that we kept the unbeaten run going. That’s great that they’re conscious of that themselves.

“From my point of view it was the manner of the performance, really pleasing, to see the game out late on as we did, you could see the enjoyment within it.

“I have to give praise to the three first-team lads because I thought they were really good around the ground.

“They gave them a reassurance and encouragement throughout and Dacky with his first 90 minutes for a long, long time.”

“The lads deserve credit for where they are but we need to get them to realise that while they’re in that place how good it is and we keep performing to the level certain people are.”

Rovers took the lead late in the first courtesy of a near post finish by Vale. The Foxes levelled soon after the break but Rovers were soon back on top, with substitute Nolan and Dack rounding off the win.

“We always knew it was going to be a tough game. Leicester started out with a formation different to what we were expecting,” Barr said.

“I thought we were really good in the first half, but having said that, I thought Leicester had three really good chances.

“We managed to get a foothold and I thought we were a threat, we took the lead just before half time and then Leicester went back to their preferred shape.

“For the first five or 10 minutes of the second half I thought they were better than us, but after that I thought we controlled the last 35 minutes of the game and it was a really pleasing performance all round.

“It was a pleasing performance where I didn’t think we had what I would deem a weaker player, I thought everyone was as good as they could be on the night.”