Joe Widdowson thinks Leyton Orient’s league record over AFC Fylde this season is a big confidence booster for the side going into their FA Trophy final this weekend.

The O’s were 3-1 victors on the away trip to Lancashire back in November, with Macauley Bonne and Josh Koroma’s brace sealing the three points, while Bonne was also on target in the 2-0 home win in March after Marvin Ekpiteta had headed his side in front.

The defender insists, though, that Orient will be fully focussed in their preparation to face a difficult opponent.

He said: “We know Fylde are a good team. They’ve got good players and they place nice football. We’re well aware of their threats but I think the fact that we have done well against them this season will definitely give us confidence but I’m sure they’re wary of us and the threats that we’re going to pose for them.”

The O’s already have one piece of silverware under their belt this season having secured the National League title, thus making a return to the Football League, and Widdowson is looking forward to the occasion and hopefully completing the non-league double.

He said: “Winning the cup would be fantastic and would be the icing on the cake for the season. The fact that we’re already promoted is brilliant. That was our main priority and we’ve achieved that, so we’re really pleased with how the season’s gone and we’d like to finish that off well at Wembley.

“I think the fact that we’ve won the league has really relaxed us. I can only speak for myself but I’m going to go into the game feeling confident and really looking forward to enjoying the occasion. I feel like we’ve worked so hard throughout the season and we’ve achieved our ambition so this is almost like a reward for us. It’s a free game and I think we’ll go into it with a lot of freedom and we’ll look to enjoy ourselves.”

The club have sold in excess of 20,000 tickets for the final, enormously outnumbering the Fylde support and the numbers for the two teams in the FA Vase final a few hours before, and Widdowson feels that the incredible support is what will give them the edge on the day.

He said: “It’s the end of the season and the hard work has been done for us. This is a chance for us to go and enjoy a great occasion at Wembley in front of a huge crowd. Most of us probably won’t have played in front of this number of people. It’s just going to be a great game. Lovely surface, hopefully the sun is shining and we can all enjoy it and lift the cup at the end of it.

“We’ve been well supported all season, everywhere we’ve gone, home and away. It will probably be triple, quadruple the number of fans, maybe more, which will be lovely and I think for them it will be a great day out to see the team hopefully win another cup and celebrate the double.”