After top-scoring for Barrow AFC last season, Jack Hindle struggled to get going in the current campaign and he has revealed it was off-field issues that had affected him.

Hindle, who scored 12 goals after signing from Colwyn Bay in the summer of 2018, has yet to start in the National League this season, with manager Ian Evatt believing that he wasn't looking the same player.

He was left out of the matchday squads completely for the recent matches against Woking and Hartlepool United, but he has since then forward his way back into Evatt's plans.

He did his confidence the world of good by scoring twice in the 3-3 draw against Oldham Athletic in the Lancashire Senior Cup last week before doing likewise in the 12-11 penalty shoot-out win that followed.

When asked why it's taken him a while to hit his stride this time around, Hindle said: "I think if was just stuff off the pitch - football is a mental game and stuff happened to me off the pitch and I didn't get my head around it.

"I had to adapt and change and sort myself out and I feel a lot better now, so hopefully I can go from there."

Hindle certainly looked more like his old self against Oldham, with Evatt delighted with how he led the line as one of the more senior players in the line-up that night.

The 25-year-old then came on as a substitute in last Saturday's 3-0 win against Solihull Moors and looked like a man on a mission despite the game being done and dusted, as he wants to force his way into the starting line-up.

Hindle said: "In that team last Tuesday, I was probably one of the more senior players and you've got to take that responsibility and make sure you set that tempo from the front, which I think I did.

"I was happy with my performance and obviously gutted to be left out on Saturday because I thought that maybe I would have got a start.

"I spoke to the gaffer about it and that's fine, it's a team game, it's a long season ahead and, more importantly, we got the three points and got back-to-back wins for the first time this season."

Hindle accepts it is up to him to keep improving if he is going to challenge the likes of Scott Quigley and Dior Angus for a place up front, with competition more fierce than it was last season.

"Last season, I scored four goals in four games and started with flying colours, but this I've not, so I'm not going to play," he said.

"It's down to me and competition doesn't faze me at all, whether that's last season or this season. It's down to my performance at the end of the day."