Roy Hodgson expects Jordan Ayew to continue to improve after a promising start to the season for Crystal Palace.
The Eagles forward has scored twice in five starts in the Premier League after netting two goals in five appearances for Ghana in the African Cup of Nations.
Despite not having a summer break Ayew has looked more comfortable in Palace colours with strikes in the wins over Manchester United and Aston Villa. The £2.5m signing has shown greater composure to accompany an impressive work-rate that has impressed his boss.
Hodgson believes 28-year-old feeds off of knowing he is an important player and he will only get better as he continues to be the focal point of the attack.
He said: "I am very impressed with Jordan, the way he had such a good tournament in Africa Cup of Nations and came back virtually without any rest at all and immediately threw himself into pre-season.
"In the pre-season matches he really showed the fire and hunger he displayed in the latter stages of the season before and I think he is a player who the more he plays, the more confidence he gets from knowing that he is one of first names on the team-sheet and likely to play every week and he starts to know his team-mates better and understand the moves we are looking for and his team-mates are looking for.
"I expect him to continue to improve as we go along because for a long period of time in that first season where we had him on loan, he was only playing bit-parts, sometimes coming on as a substitute or sometimes not coming on at all, but this season he is rejoicing in the fact I am playing him from the start and giving him the responsibility of being the number nine focal point of the attack."
The difference between being a bit-part player for the south London club and becoming a starting XI regular appears to have been a key part to Ayew already equalling his goal-tally from his season on loan at Selhurst Park.
The striker appears to have escaped his rut.
Hodgson said: "We talked about Christian being in a bit of a rut and not scoring the goals he hoped to score and Jordan to some extent was like that last season too. He was was getting into goalscoring positions, but was not always taking the chance and that weighs on people.
"Even though you try hard as a coach and as coaching staff to make it clear you shouldn't get hung up about it, and you should keep working and trying hard to rectify any problems you might have and things will change and of course he has scored two of our four goals this season and that makes a big difference."
