Town boss Kieran McKenna says multiple player of the year award winner Wes Burns’s career pathway is a lesson for younger players.
Burns carried off the Players’ Player gong and the Corporate Sponsors Player of the Year award at Tuesday night’s End-of-Season Dinner. The Welshman is the hot favourite for the Supporters Club’s trophy, which will be handed out at a sell-out event following Saturday’s final game against Charlton.
"I think he’s said it’s been the best season of his career,” McKenna said. "I guess that’s a lesson maybe for young players and for everyone really that career pathways are very varied, not always in a straight line.
"Wes has played different positions, I’ve been watching and talking about some of his old stuff playing as a striker and playing as a left winger at times, he had a lot of time as a striker in his early career.
"Probably later in his career then he’s found his path a little bit deeper on the pitch, at right-back at Fleetwood at times and now more of a sort of hybrid wing-back role.
"He’s had a good range of experience in his career and is still improving. I think that’s the big thing, he’s 27 but he’s still improving in his career, still wants to improve every day, get better, set new targets for himself and he’s shown that you can certainly keep improving and developing over your career.
"He’s had a very productive season in terms of his goals and assists and also in my time he’s been very robust in terms of making himself available for lots of games.
"He’s had to play through injuries and little niggles at times. We haven’t had as much cover in that position as we would like and he’s always done his best to make himself available and try and stay on the pitch for 90 minutes.
"I think there’s a lot that he can be pleased with and knowing him now it’ll be about setting new targets for next year.”