Input field with type date or type text

I have a Laravel app with a date field.

When I use "type=text"

<input type="date" class="form-control" id="startdate" placeholder="Start date" name="startdate" />

I get the value that is stored in my database.

When I use "type=date"

<input type="date" class="form-control" id="startdate" placeholder="Start date" name="startdate" />

I get dd/mm/yyyy and a dropdown (datepicker) to select a number for each of these. I would have expected that the dd, mm and yyyy would be pre-filled with the date from my database.

While input=text is working, I don't like that as the uses can then type in any text in that field.

What is the best way to do this? Keep the input=date and fix that or put it to input=text and do server side validation?

via Chebli Mohamed