Sam Burns is getting the rewards for all of his hard work, after scoring twice in the win at Arsenal.

The Under-23s frontman now has six goals for the season which have all come in his last five starts after netting twice in Friday night’s victory against the Gunners.

Burns scored Rovers’ second and third goals in the 3-0 success that keeps them second in Premier League 2, and completed a good week for Billy Barr’s side, and the youngster, who also scored twice in the 5-1 win over Southampton on Monday.

Having also scored the equaliser in the 1-1 draw at Tottenham, as well as opening the scoring in a draw at Manchester City last month, it’s been an excellent run of form infront of goal for the teenager.

Prior to this run, the 19-year-old hadn’t scored in 10 appearances for the Under-23s, but leading the line with endeavour and workrate, he has made his contribution to the side in other ways.

But he’s added goals to his game of late, and Barr said: “Sam’s in some good form at the moment and the defence were resolute and solid at the other end.

“Sam’s been unlucky in certain games, but he’s finding his goals by being in the middle of the goal.

“It’s no coincidence that he’s getting more chances and getting more goals by remaining in the position that he is.

“The learning behind that is good and there are lots of connections with the players out there on the pitch, those partnerships have improved dramatically as the season’s progressed.

“We’re finding different ways to be successful in different games.”

Captain Louie Annesley was the only player over the age of 19 as Rovers kept up their pursuit of leaders Manchester City.

And Barr added: “It was probably the youngest squad that we’ve had this season, but the group are in a good place and it was another good test for us.

“We’d lost to them (Arsenal) at Leyland earlier in the season and the pleasing thing was that even the Arsenal staff were discussing how well we played and how much we deserved the win this time around.

“It’s a good week’s work for us, a really good week for us.”

One area that Barr has looked for his side to improve on this season is their use of the ball, enjoying much more possession than they did in the previous campaign.

However, it was the counter-attacking threat of Burns, Connor McBride, who scored his 11th of the season from the spot to put Rovers ahead, and Sam Durrant, which caused Arsenal all kinds of problems.

“I was quite disappointed that we didn’t dominate the ball as much as we could have,” said Barr, whose side scored all three goals in the first half.

“Maybe I’m just not used to us not having the ball.

“I think the first-half statistics showed that Arsenal had just over 60 percent of the ball, but we were clinical.

“We counter-attacked really well, Connor and Sam had a really good link together and that was really pleasing.

“Arsenal still had really talented footballers on show, but as a group we were better than them on the night.”