Jack Hindle is nearing the end of his first season at Barrow AFC and the striker is determined to work right up until its conclusion to improve his all-round game.

It has been a profitable campaign at Holker Street for Hindle, who is level as the Bluebirds’ top scorer with the now-departed Tyler Smith on 11 goals with four matches remaining.

However, the 25-year-old is still working hard on the training ground on aspects of his game that manager Ian Evatt and his staff believe he needs to get better at.

Never was this more the case than the week leading up to last Saturday’s match at Dagenham & Redbridge after Evatt felt Hindle and fellow forward Jamie Philpot hadn’t done themselves justice against Boreham Wood.

It appeared to have an effect, as Hindle and Philpot gave the East Londoners’ defence a hard time and showed promising signs of forming a good partnership.

Hindle said: “We’ve been working quite a lot on build-up play and holding the ball up better and being more reliable up there, working with the rugby pads and stuff like that.”

“I’ve been working more on holding it up and playing it back because I’ve been playing wide this year and more running the channels and stuff the year before [at Colwyn Bay].

“It’s about becoming that target man so I can add to my game and add another string to the bow, really.”

Hindle will be looking to put more of what he’s learned into practice tomorrow, as he is likely to start Barrow’s home game against Dover Athletic, a team he has fond memories of facing.

It was against the Whites that Hindle came off the bench to score both the Bluebirds’ goals in the 2-0 win in Kent last September that gave his side their first away win in the National League this season.

Hindle said: “I loved it down there earlier on in the season. I was left out and the gaffer was saying to me the day before ‘you’ll come on and win us the game, you’ll change the game.

“I was disappointed to be left out and I came on quite early and I had four chances, took two of them, and was disappointed not to have got a hat-trick, so hopefully that will be the case at the weekend.”

The clash against Dover is AFC’s penultimate home game of the season and Hindle sees it as a great chance for them to pick up their form on their own turf, where they haven’t picked up enough wins as they would have liked in recent months.

"It will be interesting as the weekend because the fans have been really good and for the last few weeks and they've been giving the under-16s free tickets and stuff," Hindle said. "It's nice to be playing at home because the pitch is really good, compared to some of the others in the league."