After last season yielded just four goals, Paul Hayes looks to have blown off the cobwebs and found his goalscoring touch again.

The Wycombe Wanderers captain has registered three times in all competitions this campaign, and looks closer to the player whose goals fired Wycombe to a play-off final in 2015.

The reason, Hayes explains, is simple. The service he is receiving this season is playing to his tune and allowing him to do what he has done for his entire career.

“I always debrief my performances in games and over a season, and I could have scored more goals last season if I had more service,” the 32-year-old said.

“This season I have been given more service, been given the chances and I have been able to put them away.”

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of Hayes’ tally of goals this season is the clinical manner in which he has finished all three.

He added to a delicate chip against Northampton Town with a controlled first time strike and sumptuous effort with the outside of his right foot against Portsmouth on Saturday.

Both of his strikes at Fratton Park were assisted by Garry Thompson as a relationship which stems back to playing together at Scunthorpe United reignited.

“Thommo and I are very good friends at the club and we had a lot of success assisting and scoring goals together at Scunthorpe, maybe that helps” Hayes said.

“I know when he gets the ball out wide all he is thinking about doing is getting the cross in.”

Thompson’s best position has been a bone of contention since he joined the club last summer and the 35-year-old has been used in a number of attacking roles.

He regularly partnered Hayes as an out and out forward last term in a season which saw Thompson score eight times in 49 appearances in all competitions.

That return made him the club’s top scoring attacker, but Wanderers’ wealth of striking options, which includes Adebayo Akinfenwa, Dayle Southwell and Paris Cowan-Hall, should see him return to the wing.

Hayes believes that can only help Thompson and feels Wanderers fans will see a different player this season.

“Thommo is one of the quickest at the club, is physically strong and up until last season has played all of his career out wide. He is a right winger,” Hayes explained.

“He had to play up front last season due to the fact we didn’t have anyone else to play alongside me. That has been hard for him.

“It is always hard to judge someone who is playing out of position. You will play there for the gaffer because anyone would, but you are not going to play your best football out of position.

"To be thrown up front, he obviously is not going to play his best football and he is very happy to play out wide because that is what he wants to do."