Sammie Szmodics has set his sights on more goals after rising to the top of Colchester United’s scoring chart.

Szmodics’ winning goal against Lincoln City was his seventh of the season and he has already surpassed his personal tally of five, from the previous campaign.

The 22-year-old’s scoring exploits have been impressive, especially as he missed six weeks of the League Two campaign because of an ankle injury.

And after moving above team-mate Mikael Mandron in Colchester’s leading scorer stakes, the former Stanway School pupil is now hungry for more goals.

Szmodics told the Daily Gazette: “It’s a great feeling to be top scorer at my boyhood club.

“I just want to keep playing and keep getting in the team and getting minutes and the goals come as a bonus.

“I’m hitting a good run of form at the minute and I just want to keep scoring goals now.”

Szmodics has played his part in helping Colchester become the form team in League Two, after John McGreal’s side embarked on a six-match league unbeaten run.

The U’s head into this weekend’s game at second-placed Notts County lying just two points off the play-off places, following their 1-0 win over Lincoln on Tuesday night.

The Colchester-born attacker says they will head to Meadow Lane full of confidence.

“We’ll go to Notts County to win,” said Szmodics, who has now scored 19 career goals.

“After a performance like the one against Lincoln, there’s no reason why we can’t go there and get three points.

“We’re confident that we’re going to keep clean sheets and that allows us to go on the counter attack a lot quicker.

“We defended fantastically in the second half and like the gaffer says in the changing room, if we can keep clean sheets we also have the capability to score goals.

“If we keep getting these clean sheets, we’re just going to keep rising up the table.

“Everyone works hard to get back in and defend but as a midfielder or attacker, it’s great to know that we have three big, six-foot plus defenders with Kane (Vincent-Young) and Jacko (Ryan Jackson) either side.

“And big Sammie Walker in goal is in the form of his life, at the minute.”

Szmodics struck in the third minute to secure Colchester victory over Lincoln and he feels scoring early on was vital.

He added: “Getting a goal early on in the first half really settled us down a bit.

“I felt I could have got a couple more goals and one of them was ruled out for offside.

“I had a couple of chances and so did Drey (Wright) but we knew what Lincoln were about but we dealt with it fantastically.”

Colchester United’s under-15s host their Arsenal counterparts in the Floodlit Cup group stages tonight at the Weston Homes Community Stadium, kick-off 6.30pm.