Jeff Stelling claimed last night that Hughes didn't want to keep the best kids at the club, which is slightly curious, as Hughes' vision was all about bringing kids through and creating a young team that is sustainable from the local area.

Would be a very high-risk strategy to get rid of most of the squad and assuming that you can replace them with free transfers, especially as he said that nobody from outside the area wants to come to Hartlepool, unless he had a bunch of signings already lined up...

Makes little sense put like that. Maybe he means that Hughes was in favour of selling James and Baldwin to provide funds to buy half a dozen experienced players because he felt the squad was weak enough for strengthening to stop the slide to be the priority?

Rightly or wrongly, Hughes made a lot of team choices that didn't meet with broad satisfaction. I think if people were honest, they'd have to admit it looked very much like he was putting the young 'uns in as a last resort. Even when there was realistically nothing left to play for.

I believe if he was still here, we'd still be frustrated with his team selections and Ritchie would still be in his ideal team. Pure conjecture of course.

I just keep my fingers crossed that when we see Cooper II's first competitive team sheet we aren't frustrated.

I wouldn't take much notice of what stelling says tbh.

..... we are in agreement.