Walsall forward Conor Wilkinson was pleased to open his account for the club on Saturday and felt it had been a long time coming.
The 26-year-old scored the only goal of the game as the Saddlers picked up their first victory of the 2021/22 season against Stevenage on Saturday.
The forward was relieved to see the ball hit the back of the net after being denied by the post or good saves in previous matches.
After a composed finish to get off the mark Wilkinson explained his thinking in the build up to the goal.
“The defender made my mind up for me because once the full-back fell over, the defender came out and squared me up so I knew if I took it on my left, he wasn’t going to be able to get across and then luckily enough it’s gone in,” he said.
“I feel like it’s been coming a long time now. I’ve been unlucky, I’ve hit the post a couple of times and last week I had a header saved but when things are going for you, they go in for you but when they’re not, they’re not so it’s nice to get off the mark and hopefully we can get some more kicking in.”
“It’s been tough, I wanted to come here and hit the ground running and it’ll be ideal to score on your first game but it hasn’t been that, it’s been five games in.
“I’ve had to take it as it comes and you do lose confidence but it was nice, especially five minutes in, to get off the mark and it gets you flying for the rest of the game.”
The Saddlers bounced back from last weekend’s defeat to Hartlepool with a win and a clean sheet at the Banks’s Stadium.
Wilkinson felt the team imposed themselves Stevenage and was pleased to see their hard work pay off.
“That was always the Head Coach’s message going into the game,” he explained.
“We need to turn the first 10/15 minutes and then we can show how good we are on the ball. We needed to earn the right to go and play today and I thought we did that, first 10 minutes we got stuck in and we’ve been working a lot this week on our beliefs, what we want to do as a team and we nailed them down and reaped our rewards.”
Matthew Taylor’s side now turn their attention to Saturday’s trip to Bradford City.
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