in our 3rd season in this division it will be the best every achievement by this club in my lifetime. The third season is the crucial one after 2 competent seasons in the 1990's relegation under Busby, after 2 excellent seasons in 2004 and 2005, under Cooper, relegation under Scott/ Stephenson.

The parallels are remarkable the thrid season in the 19990's saw departure of top players like the goal scoring Saville, midfield play maker in Emerson and the return of a former star in Houchen. 2005 saw several new signings, but none any good and the loss of Boyd & Porter, 2009 sees several new signings and the departure of Porter and the return of the former Boy wonder Boyd who is nowhere near the player that her was in 2005.

To cap it all managment changes are apparent in94-95, 2005-06 and 2009-2010. A sense of realism chaps if Tubby keeps us up, and I am not his greater fan as he is tactically poor, but an excellent motivator, he will deserve to be recognised as achieving the greatest feat of any manager in Pools history.
If we finish 19th or 20th and avoid relegation that will be a success. Let everyone not forget it come dark days in February 2010.

Boyd nowere near the player he was? Have you watched him extensively?

I get what you are saying but we've surely moved on as a club? You can't make comparisons to the early 90's when we were on the verge of being wound up, the club was in a shambolic state. We were playing in this division with a squad that would have struggled in the fourth division, our ground was Northern League standard and we trained at Grayfields.

Turner can compete financially with the rest of the division apart from a couple of exceptions he said that himself at the recent fans forum. If we avoid relegation by one place I'd be royally pissed off and be suggesting it's time we changed the manager

Lets have a right go and see how high we can get, we have no reason to feel fazed by this level of football anymore. We've been playing at it for 6 of the last 7 seasons and should never have been relegated the season we went down.

I am as determined as the next person supporting POOLS, but as poster said earlier look at the quality in this division this season & level of signings by other clubs. Charlton, Soton, Norwich, Leeds, Milwall, MK Thongs, do not rule out Wycombe, Brentford, Colchester, Danny Wilson's SwineFludon or Orient - talking about Orient I saw Boydy twice last season once against us at brisbane road & he was really slow, but skilful, but he has been unfit since January - retruning starts have never been as good second time around unless your name is Paul Dobson!

This division is as good as the championship next season make no mistake it has never been as strong.

Sorry mate but that's rubbish.

It's still the third tier of English football, it's as always the 45th-68th best teams in England.

The likes of Norwich, Southampton, and Charlton didn't get relegated because they are good sides or stable clubs.

the 'mighty' Leeds have proven that a big name and a big squad do not always mean success. We will struggle to reach the top half however we HAVE to show an improvement next season, no excuses.

agree with you, but the worry is Boyd & Brown bit like Porter are very injury prone. I agree the defence looks bobbins - see 2-0 down after 20 mins tonight. Maybe the Healy snub may mean we either buy a centre rarf with pace or put Liddle in there - I cannot see why not.

I heard the day the keeper signed that he is $hite

but that still makes him better than the two we had last season

I like this train of thought balltofeet, not because I am defeatest or lack ambition but because I am old.

i have folowed us for ages and do appreciate where we are at. Man! a third season at this level, its hard to think of it as a positive but it would be an achievement, relatively.

I remember watching a whole "Look North" once waiting to see a mention of us staying up after a final day of the season win at Bradford against the odds. I was there and going mad with joy, and "Look bloody North" spent half the show talking and showing [size=85]newcastle doing some open top bus trip celebrating eff all (can't remember what. They didn't even mention us - and I still hold a grudge against it. It was the Emerson era, if I remember right.

If this is the most succesful season by staying up - bring it on.

Ah! bollox , I tried to make the word newcastle in really small letters but couldn't, like I said I'm old- I would of written to you all in those days and could of made the letters as small as I wanted to.

"Look North" is the scum of scum programmes, NEVER mention Pools, only scores briefly, and rant on about Newcastle and Darlo, there is something definitely wrong there. The producer is DEFO a DARLO supporter. Got some big grief with us.

Do you mean newcastle

Its a big "if" going by last nights game.