Ruel Sotiriou deserved his goal against Newport County, according to teammate Dan Happe.

The youngster scored his second goal in as many games for Leyton Orient when he headed home from Josh Wright’s free-kick inside the first two minutes of the 1-1 draw.

He also struck late on having entered as a substitute in the 3-1 Boxing Day defeat to Colchester United.

Speaking to the club website after the game, Happe said: “He deserves that. He works hard on the training ground, he got his chance the other day, scored, got his chance today and started, scored again. I’m proud of him.

“When you’re performing like that and you’re scoring goals, you’re going to keep your place in the side.

“It was a good point. I think we could have got three points but we’ll come here and take it. I’d have snatched your hand off if we could take a point before the game, so it’s a good one on the road.”

After Orient took their narrow lead into half time, Newport put on a lot of pressure in the second half with lots of long balls into the area and winning the ball back with some strong tackles, but Happe felt it was something that the side coped well with.

He said: “I think that’s something we can handle, a dogfight. Last year I think we got a lot of that in the league below and I think it suits us in a way.

“I think we handled it well and when we can play, we try to but we’ll handle whatever comes our way.

“When you’re at home sometimes you have a different mindset, but I thought everyone switched on today and it was a serious battle out there, and I think we showed that.”

Happe has been playing out of position in recent week as he covers for the injured Joe Widdowson, and he says he’ll play anywhere Ross Embleton wants him to to get in the team.

He said: “I’ll do anything for the team, any position Ross wants me to play. I’ll fill in and just do the job as I think any other player would do.

“I’ve got Marv [Marvin Ekpiteta] and Turls [Jamie Turley] next to me. Both centre halves have been a rock at the back when they’ve been playing together in the last few games and Juddy [Myles Judd] has come in after a long time out and he’s done well, so I can’t fault any of the three.

“As a four today in the first half especially, we were solid.”

Over 400 Leyton Orient fans made the journey to South Wales to support the side, and Happe hailed the constant support that the side receive from them.

He said: “They’re always brilliant. They come in numbers all the time and especially on a Sunday as well all the way in Wales you’ve got to give credit to them every single week.”