Dapo Afolayan is hungry to add another honour to his career CV after helping fire Wanderers into the quarter-finals of the Papa Johns Trophy.
Afolayan grabbed the opening goal to set up the Whites’ 4-0 over Manchester United’s U21s which took Ian Evatt’s men into the last eight of the competition.
And the Wanderers’ frontman wants to keep the run going all the way when the Whites’ Trophy tilt resumes in January.
“For us it’s about the opportunity of possibly playing a game at Wembley and winning something,” said Afolayan – previously a promotion winner with Wanderers as a loanee from West Ham in 2021.
“As a footballer you want to win things and this is a great opportunity for players at our level to achieve that.
“We’re into the quarter-finals and we’ll see who we get in the draw and look to that after Christmas but for now it’s about focusing on the tough run of fixtures we’ve got coming ahead of us.”
While Wanderers wait to see who they will face in the quarter-finals – which are scheduled to be played in the second week of January – they turn their attention back to League One and their top-six challenge.
The Whites are due to play five league games before the next round of the Trophy and Afolayan is eager to regain momentum against Exeter City on Saturday after the impressive victory over United’s youngsters followed a first loss in four league games at Shrewsbury last weekend.
“It was a good win and a good performance. We were a bit frustrated not to score early on but when that goal came it kind of settled us down,” added Afolayan, whose sixth goal of the season after 68 minutes sparked further strikes from Aaron Morley, Amadou Bakayko and an Afolayan-assisted Conor Bradley effort.
“They’re a good side with a lot of talent and a lot of young players who will go on and have good careers in the game.
“It was about getting that first goal. It came a bit later than we wanted it but once it came, I think we settled into it even more.
“It was good to get more goals with a good variety of them; all good team goals and I think we needed that, especially after the weekend.
“We’ve had a tough couple of days, as a group, really looking at ourselves and trying to put a lot of things right.
“I think it was a good opportunity for us to get a step in ahead of Saturday before we go again in the league and to put in a good performance to go into that league game with more confidence to try and put things right and get more points on the board.”