Yannick Touré is hopeful Newcastle United Under-21s can end their Papa John's Trophy campaign on a high ahead of Tuesday's Northern Section Group C clash at Bolton Wanderers.
The young Magpies face the League Two outfit at the University of Bolton Stadium (kick-off 7pm GMT) but are unable to progress into the competition's knockout stages following away defeats to Shrewsbury Town and Crewe Alexandra.
Touré, though, is relishing the opportunity of testing himself against another Football League side, a club who plied their trade in the Premier League eight years ago.
The Senegalese-born striker, who has represented Switzerland at under-20 level, told nufc.co.uk: "I'm excited to play against a team like Bolton and so are the team. It's a good thing for us to challenge ourselves against senior teams and, hopefully, it is going to be a good game for us.
"We still want to win this game even if we cannot qualify and I know Bolton won't want to lose this game either so it will still be a one we can definitely learn from.
"It's a shame we couldn't win the games against Shrewsbury and Crewe but it is what it is and we'll be focussed on finishing strongly and giving everything against Bolton."
Newcastle's second-string head into the cup encounter following a 4-3 win against Leeds United in Premier League 2 which saw Chris Hogg's side recover from three goals down after 30 minutes to seal a stoppage-time victory at Whitley Park.
Touré sparked the commendable comeback after netting Newcastle's first goal and the forward, who joined the club in 2018 from BSC Young Boys in Switzerland, believes the impressive result against the Whites can only benefit the young Magpies going forward this term.
"I was very proud of the lads," the 20-year-old added. "It's not easy from come from behind like that but we did it and I think it has certainly given us a lot of confidence.
"It was a really good result for us and it showed we have good character in the team. We stayed in the game, didn't give up and in the end I think we deserved three points against Leeds.
"I'm always happy to score the goal and help the team. My goal came in the first half and it gave us motivation to get back into the game.
"You always need to have that mentality where if we are one or two goals behind, the game is never finished. We have to keep playing like we want to and hopefully something good can come out of it."