David McGoldrick was thrilled with his hat-trick at Leyton Orient which secured Barnsley their first away win in eight attempts.

The 38-year-old opened the scoring then, after the hosts levelled, he scored again twice early in the second half as the Reds won 3-1.

McGoldrick said: “I scored at Huddersfield last week but we didn’t win so it didn’t mean anything. This time I got a hat-trick and we got the

win that we needed. It was a perfect day at the office.

“First one, Phillo (Adam Phillips) is such a clever footballer. He's seen all the defenders running back to their goal, so he's cut it back and I just get contact on the side foot, placed it in the corner.

“Second one, scrambling from a corner, goalkeeper punched out, everyone's gone towards the ball and I've dropped back and yeah, it's just felt perfect there. I kept it low.

“On the third one, I got cut back, slipped over, picked it up and luckily my touch went inside. It took a deflection and went in. I think Philips was trying to scramble it on the line and then if he did that, I would have run after him.

“Straight away I'm thinking, let's see this out because I don't want to be on the back end of a crazy result.

“The whole team was together to win three points.”

Head coach Conor Hourihane added: “It's amazing for him at his age to be doing what he's doing, it's credit to him. I used him as an example at half-time, I felt like we could have more intensity in our pressing and our work with some individuals and I was using him as an example saying ‘he's running around like a 21-year-old boy.’

“There's a lot more fresh legs in this dressing room than David McGoldrick’s and I thought we started the second half off the back of that message really well.

“He's nice and calm in front of the goal and, when he goes out onto the pitch at the minute, he feels like he's going to score all the time. He could have even had a fourth maybe, with a half chance just before him coming off. I am delighted for him and delighted for the lads.”

On the game overall, Hourihane said: “I am very happy with the performance, we've probably won in a different way that we've not done away from home for a while really. It was a dogged performance, the game never settled down for the whole game in my opinion. I thought it might settle down a little bit in the second half but I think our early goals meant we didn't have to go and attack the game as much and we needed to be really professional in seeing the game out which we did.

“We showed a real togetherness, a real dogged performance, a real mentality and heart to want to win a game of football and credit to the lads for that.

“If we can take that defensive display moving forwards more often, we will always score goals. Credit to the lads at the back today, they handled the game really, really well, took on the information really, really well. It was a proper team performance. A squad performance, you know, people came off the pitch.”

Barnsley were 3-1 up at Orient last April in Hourihane’s first game as permanent head coach but lost 4-3.

“I saw shades of that in terms of my learning. We went 3-1 up here last year and we kept pressing and if they pick off our press, they're on our back line. But we wanted to protect our lead and kill the space behind them and, if they scored, it was going to be from a 30-yard strike or a little bit of a real clean play to play through us. So that's learning for me as well in my early head coach career.”

Mael de Gevigney came into the defence for the dropped Jack Shepherd.

“Mael was terrific today and I felt Jack Shepherd needed to come out of the team in the last couple of weeks. I was just waiting for the right time to do it.

“I was going to do it against Peterborough at home, but he played and we won. So then you keep your partnership.

“And obviously we went to Huddersfield and lost. So I just felt like today was the right time just to take him out for a game, give him a breather.

“He's been carrying a knock as well and people don't see that. Tennai Watson is managing something at the minute as well.

“I have an unbelievable relationship with Shep. He's an unbelievable guy. Yesterday, he was doing clips and using that time to maybe improve on one or two things when the heavy schedule doesn't allow you to at times.

“I'm delighted for the back line, delighted for Shep. He's still come on and contributed as he does and he'll be ready to go as soon as he gets back in the team.”

Patrick Kelly limped off in the second half. Hourihane said: “Something with his calf. There is probably going to be something there, I think, by the sounds of it.

“Obviously, we've been very fortunate with injuries over the last few weeks. But, yeah, that's definitely a disappointing one from today.”