and i personally think that given a chance to make his own signings we will have a much better season next year.

I hope you're right.

End of argument. Conclusion- I win.

Our defensive record away from home is better than that of Hereford, Cheltenham, Crewe, Carlisle, Yeovil, Oldham, Huddersfield, Southend and Scunthorpe. We only conceded three less than Peterborough. So you could equally argue that our defence would have kept us well out of trouble away from home had it not been for the pitiful efforts of the forwards, who scored less than all teams bar Hereford and Yeovil.

That is astonishing. So astonishing I had to check for myself: Home F45 A40 / Away F20 A35.
Can anyone make sense of that? With figures like that there's hardly any sense to be made from arguing.

Adjusting for the number of games managed by each, in terms of goals scored versus conceded, Wilson's away record is pretty much the same as Turner's and his home record slightly but significantly better in the goals for department. That gives food for argument in favour of concentrating on attackers but just as much food for arguing against.

only one of them had james brown available...

I hope you're right.

End of argument. Conclusion- I win.

kyle couldnt score away from home tho could he ? in fact he showed zero interest in playing in the away games.
we have lots of players who got goals at the vic, getting them away from home was the problem.
michael mckay had a better strike rate in away games than kyle.

how often in pools history have we not been in the bottom division ?

how often have we beaten a premiership side once in a season let alone two ?

what do folk expect on gates of 3500 ? we are one of the worst supported sides in the division. where were all you lot in the 70;s and 80's and 90's when we were the worst side in england ? we have nearly always been a useless outfit. if you want to support a team that is flying high in the prem go and support man utd.

on my living room wall ive got an autographed and framed photo of the 1998/1999 squad. thats 10 years ago for the thick peasants on this board .

the top row of players includes paul moss, mickey dunwell, glen downey, denny ingram, chris macdonald, j d briggs and craig lake.

the middle row includes nicky evans, mark nash, steven hutt, darren timmons, and martin pemberton.

the bottom row includes stuart brightwell, stuart irvine, gus di lella, ian clark and craig midgely.

it wasnt actually the worst pools side ive ever seen, but there was absolutely no indication of what was to come in the next 9 years.

prior to that point pools had been in the lowest division of english football for almost its entire existence, and nearly always in the bottom half of the lowest division.

we were shiit, a laughing stock, and almost permanently on the brink of going bust.

if someone had told me then that 10 years down the line folk would be kicking off because we couldnt beat leeds united at home id have assumed they were bonkers.

what do folk realistically expect from a club that pulls in attendances of 3,500 ? do they seriously expect them to compete with the likes of leeds united who made nearly 3 million quid profit last year, and who have a huge and expensively assembled squad of players, playing in front of 20 odd thousand at home ?

we beat 2 premier league teams and survived for another season in league one, serving up some decent games along the way, as well as some duffers granted.

okay it wasnt as good as we expected, but did any of the deluded, moaning, tramps on this board genuinely think we were going to finish in the top 6 ?

as for those suggesting ior/hodcroft walk away, who do you think will replace them ?

look at darlo ffs, 2 administartions and on the brink of going out of existence.

i stayed to applaud the pools players yesterday, because while some of them may not be world beaters, and some of them are little better than non league standard,and some of them have made a series of stupid bloody mistakes repeatedly throughout the season, at the end of the day they are still MY FOOKING TEAM.

those beggar tramps and peasants who only want to support them when they are doing well, or who secretly hope that they get beat every game so they can shoot their sad inadequate mouths off on here really should go and support liverpool or man utd.

in fact they probably do.

Am I the only one who thinks that this tramps and beggars stuff is also completely purile and unfunny? Some posters on here are getting a slating off you for having an opinion. It's wrong.

you say we have a squad capable of finishing outside the bottom 6, id say thats a marginal call. as mr mad john very rightly points out, once brownie got crocked, the squad actually wasnt that good.

the keepers wouldnt get a game for anyone else in this division. we have no full backs, and a distinct lack of pace at the centre of defence.

take out brown and our strikers at the time of his injury were porter, barker, mckay and foley. hardly jaw droppingly terrifying for opposition.

people keep going on about players underperforming, but the truth is that a lot of them simply are not very good. 2 or 3 have underperformed, 2 or 3 have over performed. who are these wonder players that have let us down so badly ?

WE ARE STILL A SMALL STRUGGLING TEAM. ior are losing a million a season and the chairman actually came out and said at the end of last season there was no more money for players. over the summer we added cook, jones and power to a squad that had struggled last season. 2 of those players couldnt get a game, and the third, jones, a young kid, was playing his first proper season in the league.

under what circumstances were you expecting a weaker squad to do better than last season, especially once we lost brown ?

we get gates of 3,500 so there isnt any money to spend. the people of doncaster turned out in numbers to support their football team, the people of hartlepool didnt.

Talking of Donny, I spoke to a Doncaster supporter last night and asked him whether he thought the ineptitude of the Sheffield teams had contributed to Donny's upsurgence.
In his view the answer was a definite yes. Wednesday used to be to Doncaster what the Barcodes are to Pools. United were their Borer.

so why, if we have been shyte for the 30 odd years you have been watching pools, do you suddenly expect us to be top of a division we have never topped before ?

read this slowly.... the gates are crap, the owners have spent NO money on players for over a year, they released more than twice as many at the end of last season as they brought in.

dont blame me, dont blame ior, blame the people of hartlepool who cant be arsed to support their team.

People have stopped supporting their team as they can't afford to spend £30-40 per match to watch a team making silly errors and fighting at the wrong end of the table. It's that simple. There used to be a group of around 20 of us in the Town End at every home game. Of that 20(ish) of us, 1 goes regularly (me). The reasons the others give is that they won't pay such a price to watch daft errors.

Same happened last season. Daft (normally goalkeeping) mistakes and dropping attendences. Cut out the daft errors, get a bit of consistency and the gates will go up.

I now reside in the Cyril Knowles stand!

£30-40 represents the amount of money that you would spend at the match (before and after) if you are not a tight arse.

£20 in
Couple of pints, something to eat, transport to game, programme, matchday lottery ticket etc. Soon mounts up.

Are you a tight arse like?

There's the problem. Get some food in yer stomach. Absorb the booze!

I took my own pork pie to the match on Saturday. Does that make me a tight arse?

so week in week out where are the 17,000 who went to cardiff ?

or the 10,000 that went to sunderland ?

or even the 5,500 who turned up on saturday ?

i work in the town. in my office we have 2 pools regulars, me and katcha, and another lad that goes a few times a season. of the rest we have off the top of my head, a sunderland season ticket holder, and "fans" of aston villa, man city, newcastle, liverpool and man united who all sit in the canteen discussing how their teams got on and will come out with stuff like " your lot were shiit at the weekend we will hammer you next week."

all of them play dumb as fook footie manager and have fantasy teams and wear footie gear and class themselves as footie fans. none of them go to games.

and that in a nutshell is why pools will never amount to much.
.

as well as bringing in kids from other teams we are signing non league players like alb and mckay and expecting them to compete at this level and it wont work.
.

I know what your saying but the right players do work just look at Peterbrough

To be fair, that is a rubbish example given how much Peterborough have ploughed into their team.

What there three best players all came from non-league

Very true.

However Boyd cost about quarter of a million, the keeper cost 400k, and the other two strikers Mackail Smith and Maclean were both six figure purchases too.

folk on here are blaming ior, the manager, the players , and im not trying to absolve them from blame, but you also have to ask, do the people of hartlepool actually want a successful football team, or are they happy supporting the likes of man utd, liverpool, newcastle etc ?

what would you do in hodcrofts place ? do you spend money you havent got on expensive players and management in the hope they produce a top 6 side that more people will turn up to watch, and risk bankrupting the club ?
do you cut admission and hope more people turn up ?