Matthew Fitzpatrick: I understand what it means to play for Linfield - I need to score more and I want to score more

​Fitzpatrick was one of the headline Irish League summer transfers after joining the Blues from Glenavon, where he netted 19 league goals during the 2022/23 campaign and was also named in the Premiership Team of the Season.

The 29-year-old put Linfield ahead at the Showgrounds on Saturday to register his second league goal for the Windsor Park outfit following a maiden strike against Crusaders in September, and says nobody is putting more pressure on him to perform than himself.

"Linfield and the manager brought me here for a reason,” he said. “I believe in my own ability.

"I'm just trying to put in performances and play well.

"I'm hoping if I do that I'll stay in the team and the goals will come.

"I want to score every week and I know you can't do that, but I want to score more than I have.

"I missed a couple of games at the start of the season and that didn't help me, but I've played enough where I should be scoring more than two.

"I need to score more and I want to score more.

"I understand what it means to play for Linfield and hopefully I can add more to my tally.

"Nobody puts more pressure on me than myself and I know I need to be scoring at Linfield.

"I scored a couple of weeks ago and I wanted to back it up straight away, but that didn't happen.

"I got a bit of luck today because I thought the header was in but it hit the post and fell right to me.

"That's the bit of luck you need when you're going through a drought and thankfully I got it."

Fitzpatrick’s 52nd minute strike from close range after his initial header from Joel Cooper’s cross had smashed off the post helped ease any nerves for the visitors.

The roles were switched moments later when Fitzpatrick laid it on a plate for the former Oxford United attacker before Kirk Millar’s cross squirmed under Steven Maguire to secure all three points.

"You know playing for Linfield that you're going to get chances because there are too many quality players around for that not to happen,” added Fitzpatrick. “The thing here is being clinical.

"We had loads of possession in the final third but didn't really break them down in the first-half, so the onus is on us that when we do break them down that we put those chances away.

"Thankfully in the space of 20 minutes we did that three times.

"They were well set up and really hard to break down.

"Every away game is really tough in this league now and we knew it would be tough coming here.

"We have quality players and you just hope that it's only a matter of time before we get a chance or break them down and that turned out to be the case.

"When we did break them down we got a couple in quick succession thankfully."