Barkley: My confidence is sky high

Everton’s English starlet, Ross Barkley coolly converted two penalties against Newcastle United to seal a 3-0 win for the Toffees on Wednesday night and has revealed that he feels that he can score every time he is on the pitch.

One of the penalties was a ‘panenka’ and it just shows how high Barkley’s confidence is, trying things like that. The attacking midfielder has already had his most prolific season to date for Everton, scoring 11 goals in all competitions and recording eight assists in the process.

Barkley has admitted that his long-term target is to become a Steven Gerrard-like box-to-box midfielder, but also concedes that he is happy in the advanced role he’s playing in at the moment, bringing him so much success.

The Englishman has almost a nailed on place in Roy Hodgson’s Euro 2016 squad, the real question is now; can he break into the starting lineup? Improving the weaker areas of his game gives him every chance to do so and he reveals he has been working on it with Roberto Martinez in training.

As you get older, you realise more about which positions to be on the pitch and not to come too deep, trying to to get the ball,

Barkley told the Liverpool Echo:

You can get a lot of the ball doing that but for the type of player I am and for me to show what I can do, I need to be higher up the pitch and I have been working on that in training.