PAUL Peschisolido has hailed his strike quartet as Burton Albion gear up for another chance to move into the top half of League Two at home to Port Vale tomorrow.

Only five teams have scored more than Burton's 41 goals and, against Northampton Town last week, Shaun Harrad netted his second dazzling goal in a week to reach 10 for the season and overtake Greg Pearson as top scorer.

For chunks of the season, Harrad has been unable to unseat Pearson in the starting line-up, while Steve Kabba is also currently getting a start ahead of summer signing Richard Walker.

The competition is keeping all four on their toes – and Peschisolido is very satisfied to see it.

"They say a manager is only as good as his strikers and I'm very happy with the four we've got," said the former Derby County striker.

"Goals have not been our problem.

"If you get two or three strikers in double figures, I'll tell you what, you're not going to be very far away."

Harrad's form – given that he did not start the season as first-choice – has been a particular inspiration and his scoring rate is impressive, his 10 goals having come from 19 starts.

"I think all of our strikers have a decent goal ratio, in terms of goals to starts," said Peschisolido.

"And I'm especially pleased for Shaun, because his work-rate is phenomenal.

"He's the best for that in training and he chases every lost cause in games.

"To see someone doing that gives everyone a boost.

"And it's great that he's now getting his rewards for that effort in goals."

Pearson's tally includes the only Football League hat-trick by a Burton player and he looks unlucky to be out of the side currently, while Walker has been restricted to only 13 starts all season, the last in November at Darlington.

"He wants to be playing, of course, but the two that we've been putting out have been doing well and he's just got to be patient," said Peschisolido.

"Richard is continuing to work hard in training, though.

"He is more of a target man. He's very good at bringing others into the play.

"We need them all and there'll be a time when we need that sort of a striker in a game."

As against Northampton last week, the Brewers face a team tomorrow who are just above them in a congested centre of League Two.

Port Vale have lost only five games but been held back by drawing 13.

They are level on points with Burton but have a game in hand.

After they beat the Brewers 3-1 at Vale Park last month, the talk at the ground was all about a play-off push but Peschisolido is wary of such talk about his own team.

"It was fair enough for them to talk about the play-offs – we're both only four or five points away with a lot of games to go," he said.

"But it's still our primary objective to stay in this league and we're going about that very nicely – we're enjoying our time in the Football League."

The draws emphasise that manager Mickey Adams has made the Valiants hard to beat and Peschisolido knows why.

"I know Mickey Adams pretty well and he a very experienced manager," he said.

"They're organised and they're fit. If they don't put in the work, he'll have them running morning, noon and night.

"So we will have to put in the same work-rate as them and then see if we can make our quality shine through."