3 thoughts from Barnsley 3-1 Accrington Stanley

After watching Barnsley 3-1 Accrington, here are three key standout thoughts from a Barnsley point of view written by Ian Hope.

Luca Connell - The best free signing ever

All season I have praised Luca Connell for his mature and competent performances, but today he stood out head and shoulders in the middle of the pitch.

Connell is a leader, he is one of only a few in the Barnsley side. Constantly talking, supporting, pointing and generally organising the reds during games. Sitting deep in midfield he protects the back three but today he sprung through the lines with pace and purpose creating several chances.

Always quick to sniff out danger, Connell is alive to everything the opposition do. Whilst Accrington were a poor side, Connell still nipped in winning the ball back and turning defence into attack.

Today, we saw Connell in an offensive role bursting through the Accrington midfield setting up two of Barnsley`s three goals with some incisive passing.

With his cultured left foot, Connell is being compared to another Hourihane, Mowatt or Howard other great left footed midfielders at Oakwell.

It is easy to think of players as machines with fans expectant of performances. What makes Connell`s situation even more impressive is how little football he has played in recent times.

A move to Celtic never paid off and the lad has had to settle into a new town, with new teammates, manager and formations yet this has not restricted his performances for the reds. At 21 years of age, Connell has a bright future and hopefully has many more seasons like this in the red of Barnsley.

James Norwood - A proper No 9 performance

Today was Norwood`s best game in a red shirt. He was a typical No 9, never letting defenders settle, chasing everything and bullying defenders into submission.

From minute one, he was on the front foot running all over the pitch. Two examples of this came either side of half time when Norwood sprinted (yes we haven't seen too much of that from him this season) down into the channels after lost causes and won possession out of nothing for his team.

He was aggressive with a shoot-on-sight policy and never gave the Accrington defenders a minute's peace. A fantastic performance was topped off by his wonderful overhead kick goal which set the reds on their way to three points.

Bouncebackability Today was about getting the result and back to winning ways but Barnsley gave us a performance too. After failing to score recently and having a tough January results wise the reds set the tone for the day by going at Accrington from the first whistle.

The reds have opened up a 5 point gap from 7th & 8th in the table and sit 1 point behind Bolton but have 2 games in hand on them. Derby are only 4 ahead and we have a game in hand on them and yet to play them at Oakwell.

Hopefully Barnsley can take this result onto Tuesday and an away trip to Exeter, righting wrongs from a dreadful home defeat to the Grecians back in October.

You Reds