Harry Leonard believes focusing on his role in the team is key to pushing for more first-team involvement this season. 

The striker scored once and added two assists as Rovers hit TSV Hartberg for six during the first of two friendlies in Austria. 

The teenage striker, prolific at Academy level, got his chance for the senior side with four substitute appearances to finish last season. 

He has caught the eye of Jon Dahl Tomasson again in pre-season, but knows the demands off the ball are where the hard work is needed. 

“You’re working for yourself in the Academy to try and get in the first-team, but now it’s about the team,” the teenager told the Lancashire Telegraph. 

“You look at your individual performances and if it helps the team then that’s just as good.

“I’ve still got a lot to learn off the ball. I’m getting better at it but I’m only going to get better with the more games I play and the more the manager sees me.”

Leonard has clocked up the maximum 130 minutes in the opening two friendlies and will get further chances to impress as the close season goes on. 

His aim is clear, to be around the first-team set-up and build on the positive end to last season. 

Rovers are targeting another striker in the summer window, but Leonard is up for the challenge. 

“I’m looking to be around the first-team at the start of this season, I’ve not thought about a loan or anything like that,” he added. 

“I want to fight for my place here and, if I can do that, I’ll be over the moon.

“I think if I can show my worth in pre-season and show what I can do, there’s no reason why I can’t do that.

“If someone comes in, it’s football, that’s what happens, it’ll be good competition. There are some good No.9s already in the building and it’d be good to add some extra competition.”

Leonard scored Rovers’ second of the six goals, before making numbers three and four for Ryan Hedges and Joe Rankin-Costello with excellent pieces of vision. 

Reflecting on his 70-minutes, he said: “It was good, it was quite hot, but the lads got through it well and it was good to get a goal and a couple of assists.

“Numbers are talked about a lot as a striker and goals and assists mean just as much as each other.

“Assists are just as good.”

The chance to learn from Tomasson, but also first-team coach David Lowe, is something that Leonard is making the most of given their respective playing careers came as strikers. 

More opportunities to impress lie ahead for the young striker, something he’s looking to make the most of. 

“The manager has really tried to get it into me to press forward and work really hard, Lowey as well.

“They’ve both got a really good understanding, they know how we want to play and they’ve both been trying to drill it into me every day as best as I can.

“I want to play, impress the manager and show that I can do the off the ball stuff just as well as I work on the ball.”