I posted this a couple of weeks ago. Any corrections welcome.

"Pools have got at least 16 players under contract next season.

Ferguson and Crawford signed 2 year deals last summer. Joe Grey has 2 years left on his 3 year deal.
Murray, Lacey, Paterson, Cooke, Hastie, Umerah and Ndjoli all got 2 year deals off Hartley in the summer transfer window.
Dodds, Pruti, Finney, Kiernan and Jennings all signed "permanent" deals in January - guess that means 18 months.
Dolan is on loan from Newport but it's supposed to automatically turn into a permanent deal this summer.

There might be one or two more - not sure what deals Niang and McDonald are on. Knowing Pools' luck, Niang will have another year and McDonald's deal will be up this summer."

There's a lot of dead wood there!

Players who are free agents in June include Featherstone and Sterry. Your guess is a good as mine whether they'll be offered new deals and if they'll accept them if they are offered. Sylla will definitely move on and Umerah is expected to - based on his performances before Christmas at any rate. He's been pretty poor since the New Year.

Quite scary to think that we might have the bulk of the squad still here. I'm sure we can get a few moved on. Umerah will go for starters.

Hoping some of the two yr deal no hopers will find other clubs cos they know they have no future at Pools but legally there is nowt to stop them hanging about till their contracts expire. Umerah will be sold and Sylla is already packing his case. Featherstone has been a fantastic servant to the club but he is obviously past it. I reckon Sterry will want out and even if he doesn't, should we keep him? He is injured a lot and is nowhere near the player he was last season and before.

the plus side is that we will either have umerah as our player or we will get money for him which itself is a rarety. usually its walk away for sod all. the only way sterry will re sign is if he cannot find a league club but he has still something to offer us even after a stop start season where he has still shown more than others have. the question is about the so called hastie type deadwood. could dropping a division help them and we risk it or throw away a good part of the budget by paying up their contracts. its hard to see em get a league club in england or anything above the scottish league 2 level either. more big decisions for the club to make and hope their is a change of culture and they get them right.

[quote="Flying Hogans"]

Players who are free agents in June include Featherstone and Sterry. Your guess is a good as mine whether they'll be offered new deals and if they'll accept them if they are offered.
at his age i think nicky would jump at another seasons contract unless the money offered is a joke. not as hard for him as others at his age as he never had pace to rely on anyway so has had nothing to lose.

Sterry worries me, Even when playing looks like he,s carrying, And as for Fergie, a FB who can,t stop crosses is no use what so ever.
Doubt Feathers will be here, Don,t think Askey will want him.
We be good to see Finney given a chance last two games.
Dodds is a no brainer, Pruti not convinced.
There is a serious lack of bite and energy in the central areas.
If Josh had a brain cell he would be no where near the national lge, Got sick to death of him wrestling with defenders
If thats his level of intelligence then he,s best gone.

Is mcdonald not on loan from morecambe?

There is clearly a problem with Sterry's fitness. I recall Curle saying words to the effect that only Jamie can decide if he can play or not. This sounds a bit suspect. Is he permanently crocked or is he carrying something that needs surgery but he is putting it off till the summer break? Obviously, he wouldn't want the opposition to know some part of him was vulnerable because they would be sure to give it a kick so I would not expect the injury to be public knowledge. Maybe all be revealed in the summer break.

Nope, he came from Walsall and as far as I know it is a permanent deal but I don't know if its for a year, 18months or longer.

He came from Morecombe, I'm 100% on that, but wasn't sure if it was a loan or transfer.

My apologies he was at Walsall before he went to Morecambe. He played 69 times for Walsall. He is at Pools on a permanent deal but dont know for how long.

So all the shite on for next season and all the half decent lot on their way…only at pools

I’ll be amazed if anyone but Pruti and dodds signed at Xmas are on anything more than a deal until end of season and praying to Christ we aren’t obligated to sign Dolan

Pruti, Murray, Lacey and Dolan only pools could have 4 centre halves on the books and desperately need another with some physicality

Umerah, dodds, Sylla Pruti and maybe cooke aside non of the current lot should be kept unless we have to

Murray and Lacey are weak as piss…look fwd to more goals like crawlers 2nd if they are still playing
McDonald not consistent enough
Ferguson will likely keep but needs a new start
Jennings tries but not good enough
Grey, Crawford, hastie Patterson and Ndjoli god help us couldnt find a challenge between them

We are spectacularly badly set up physically (and will be worse if Sylla goes) for the conference and am sure Askey knows that hopefully he gets a chance to ship out the shite and fix….we need another 10-12 players … again!

We are relegation bound if Murray Dolan or Lacey are anywhere near the first team

This is likely to be the shite we have to face.
Depressing.................

Woking
Barnet
Bromley
Boreham Wood
Eastleigh
Dagenham
Solihull Moors
Wealdstone
Altrincham
Dorking Wanderers
Maidenhead Utd

Ah…I have fond memories of Dagenham the 80’s…nowt to do with football though.

Peter Hartley was signed till the end of the season. How do we know? because the OS said it was a deal to the end of the season.
All of the others got "permanent deals." But hey, believe what you want.

they are just names of clubs nobody are interested in but will make it watchable if we managed to beat most of them. what has really been exciting in most of the league matches we have played in the last 2 seasons and whats all that exciting about playing even the old traditional clubs like walsall or tranmere never mind the plastics like salford or crawley.

To make it worse Kings Lynn are top in NLN and Ebbsfleet in NLS.
It gets worse.
I would rather be in the Northern League.Yes give it time i hear!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fylde won tonight to go top and should beat Bradford PA in their last game to go up as champions. I can't believe I am talking about these clubs on this forum, depressing!!!!! Could even have a Scarborough Athletic go up in the play offs, what a shit show!!!

we are playing these clubs on merit and nothing else. its not as if we have had a points deduction sending us down which was no fault of the manager or players. we would have a real gripe if that had happened.

You are spot on. The club has got what it deserves, no question.

And we have not!!!

Yes, indeed. The Pools fans deserve a stable club that wins a few games and maybe flirts with the play offs but instead their loyalty has been rewarded with the gift of Conference football. Like a few on here, I grew up with Pools in the 70s staggering from one re-election battle to the next with gates of around 2,000. That was the regular state of affairs, year on year. The enthusiasm for the club since regaining league status in Bristol was phenomenal but the club has rewarded this this with miserable capitulation. Sickening

unless there are big changes around the best we can hope for is becoming a NE version of barnet with a few years in non league broke up by a couple back in the EFL again and then back once more.

Yep, a yo yo club.

yeh we shouldn't be arrogant on these teams, most likely the ones coming up to the conf will be a hell of a lot better organized than the ones coming down!

and some playing at their highest level ever with there club on the up and not down. like pools would have been at the time if they had got into the championship, on a big high playing struggling ex premier league clubs going the opposite way. that really is the 12th man.

In the 70s we went to the match to watch pools, NOT expecting a win but to go and enjoy the match.
A win was a bonus.
Don,t know if i,m wearing rose tinted glasses but don,t recall players not giving 100%

But now it seem really easy to see some who are not OR just really not good enough, I hope the latter.

All that shite there will probobly have bigger budgets than us next season barring the Wealdstone and dorkings. It doesn't look a very appealing set of fixtures does it. How raj entices 3500 to 4000 to go to them games god knows.

Is The Bunker Banner next seasons team photo ?

Not sure why you'd assume that? The season we went up Pools spent the 5th most in the National League on agents' fees. Only Notts County, Solihull Moors and Dagenham who are still in the division spent more. Hopefully County will go up as they try to buy their way out of the division every season!

We know the National League is a tough division but the majority of clubs haven't got a fortune to spend on players.

NO: its this seasons.

Don,t think Stockport have spent loads this season.

Only £237,000 on agent fees alone! Spare change really

https://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/spor ... 23-4088463

Seriously, £1 million plus on transfers just to guarantee a play-off place for a Fourth Division side. The world's gone mad.

Stockport fans will expect their current momentum to carry on until at least the Championship.
After all Rotherham, Southend, Donny, Burton and Even Scunthorpe have done it in the not so distant past. Then there's Brentford, Bournemouth and Brighton who've gone further.
They'll be talking about a forty thousand seater stadium in next to no time.
DC will be touted as England manager unless he starts to stutter but there's always a route back to Fylde for our Dave.
It doesn't take much to turn the lovers into haters when it comes to footy fans.

Probably only spending what they have recieved from the EFL.

Evans is a tit but his achievement with Stevenage is impressive given their budget relative to others.

Amazing we were mismanaged worse than Crawley though--what a shambles

In the 70’s a crowd of 2,000 was a luxury….. and an away win was like winning the lottery…..

Mr Hogan
Got in touch with a Stockport supporter to enquire how much they spent below is his reply.

"Didn't spend a penny in the summer, it all went on agent fees; some money spent in January, Olaofe was a six-figure fee, but it's all undisclosed. Even adding it all together I can't see it being anywhere near a million"

c ould have all gone on players wages though to attract them to the club thats looking up rather than down. even if the wage offered was the same as pools who in their right mind would pick us over them. they deserve a bit of good fortune being in the wilderness for longer than us and dropping even lower to one that soom poolies are craving for.

I based the £1 million on there being over a quarter of a million spent on agents' fees. FIFA announced new caps of agents fees in January limiting them to 5%-10% of a transfer fee or player's wages, but it doesn't come in straight away. For this season, 15%-20% going to agents is the norm.

Whether the agents got a cut of a new Stockport player's transfer fees or wages, it will still add up to OVER £1 million spent on new players for this season.

You could well be right.

But i believe in the real world, Agents are also paid for persuading players who are free or nearing the contracts end to join a certain club.

IOR wouldn’t deal with agents and Pools had success with out agents in the IOR days.

I agree entirely with Hodcroft's stance. If a player decides he wants an agent to work in that player's interest then the player should pay the agent. He is, after all, employing him.
Of course if an individual club want to foot the agent's bill then that is their choice but it should be a choice and not conditionary.

Imagine the real great escape team of Watling, Potter, Goad, Dawes etc against this lot. It would be a bloodbath with the current team beaten easily. This is despite the ages. After all Mally Dawes is 70 odd now.

George Potter took no prisoners, but find a place for John Gill, the ultimate terminator…… “they shall not pass and if they do they won’t repeat the feat’.

In Askey's pre-match interview on the OS he's asked what went wrong for an 8 match unbeaten run to turn into 3 straight defeats. The only thing he can point to is 'Mus' (Murray) getting injured.

Some of the footballing 'experts' on here will be incredulous, but the fact is the defence has looked shambolic without his steadying presence. Dodds, Pruti, Foran all have more ability than him. They're quick and athletic - but very green, especially Pruti and Foran.

Murray provided them with leadership and organisation, and it was him who attacked the ball when it was hoofed up towards the Pools box. They've been headless chickens without him, and watching Dolan fail miserably to do the same job underlines how much of a miss he's been.

Who is going to sit down and negotiate new contracts, Pools don’t have a Chief Executive ?

who did that work before that position was invented.