Motherwell star Kevin van Veen has Celtic star Kyogo Furuhashi in his sights after bagging a late brace to sink Ross County on Saturday.
The Dutchman took his tally to 17 for the season with his goals in a 2-0 win over the Staggies in the Highlands, adding to the hat-trick he produced against them in Dingwall earlier in the season.
Victory over Malky Mackay's men fired the Steelmen six points clear of their rivals in the Premiership and ninth-place Motherwell now sit 10 points clear of rock bottom Dundee United as new boss Stuart Kettlewell's strong start to life at Fir Park continued.
Motherwell have now taken 10 points from 12 under his stewardship to put them on track to avoid relegation, which seemed a distinct possibility just a few weeks ago.
Players are finding their form again and van Veen is one such case, and as well as firing Motherwell up the table, he is targeting Scotland's top scorer Furuhashi.
Celtic's Japanese striker has hit 24 goals in all competitions this season for the league leaders, leaving van Veen seven goals behind him in the overall standings and six in the league charts (19 compared to 13).
But the 31-year-old is eager to get close to Kyogo's figures and pick up a career-best total in the progress.
Van Veen said: "I’m on 17 now but it could easily have been 20-plus already.
“I gave a penalty to Louis Moult against Hearts to give him confidence and I missed the one against Dundee United.
“There are others I missed as well that are still haunting me because I am a perfectionist.
“I want to bang everything in and the easiest chances I have missed while the tougher ones I have scored.
"From now on, everything is going to hit the back of the net. I am confident I won’t miss anything any more.
“My highest total for a season was 23. I am going for that at least but as long as I keep helping my team, that’s the most important thing.
“I’m going to try to do my best to challenge the top scorers in this league.
“Kyogo is the highest and I am a big fan of his. Hopefully I can go near him but it will be tough to do so.”
Meanwhile, van Veen says Kettlewell's transformation has made "everybody believe again" and he will be hoping they pick up where they left off when they return from the international break on March 18 to face Rangers at Fir Park.
He added: "The gaffer has been good. When he came in as interim manager, it was a tough time.
“It was a bit turbulent everywhere including losing the chief executive Alan Burrows, a very good man.
“Then the previous gaffer, Steven Hammell, lost his job due to us playing just terribly.
“But the new manager came in and made everybody believe again.
“He is very detailed and he knows everything about every player in this league.
"The way he prepares us, the way he shows us the other teams’ strengths and weaknesses, it’s all been paying off so far.
“Hopefully we can keep it going. We need to keep fighting for him because we let the other manager down.
"It’s a very good feeling at the club and we don’t want to lose that again and be back to where we were a few weeks ago because it wasn’t a good place to be.”
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