so you are admitting you can be a drama queen?

Well its a start!!

People take football too seriously. That's the problem.

As you say, the craic is what it should all be about win, lose or draw. If I lived in town, I'd go to home games every week regardless of our position and would enjoy it regardless.

Some valid points there Mr Dibble.

But what if you can't go to a game cos they've made it all ticket and won't sell tickets when people aren't at work?

Is there an ecco in here?

no you certainly havent been alone or even the worst for the negativity.

Lets hope a few more take your lead.

[x] Replies will divide along the well established divide.

Half the problem is the messageboards create a magnified environment of any given situation. It offers a discussion group where people feed of each others energy, be it positive or negative. The minutae is disected and debated ad nauseum and as in every walk of life, people generally follow the consensus and if that is to pounce on every word the manager says then it is what will happen.

This 'big club' thing that Turner is being slated over for example. I hate to dispel illusions but he's got a point. How the hell can Pools compete consistantly with the likes of Leeds and Norwich when they have 25k-30k coming through the doors every game? Do the maths. It's not just the funding either; its far easier to convince a player with no affinity to Hartlepool to come to a former premier league team with a big name, big stadium and big support than it is to come oop North and play at Pools in front of 3000 people with an arctic wind blowing up your arse. Yes there will be exceptions such as where an Exeter beats Leeds but the league table doesn't lie and the clubs with the finance are at the top.

With the cashflow that Pools have we are indeed punching above our weight. You can cry all you want to but its basic economics.

Yesterdays performance by all accounts was good and there have been no accussations of a lack of effort. Call me old fashioned but thats all I ask. If the opposition have better players then all things being equal we're going to lose. I can't accept them lying down and dying but if they give of their all then I've no complaints.


.

Hooray for common sense.

ADG for President.

All together "i promise not to slag Chris Turner off any more"

Is this not what forums like the bunker is for, fans of the club with a common goal of wanting success for our club, to feel free to make comments about how they feel the team/club/management is doing without fear of having sanctimonious rantings back at you? Just accept it we are little Hartlepool who will never amount to anything. I don't think so.

Where else can we air our frustrations and voice our opinion, the letters page in The Mail, directly to the board or to the management?

We ALL want what's best for our club and I for one DO care about the division we play in because I want my club to be the best it can be and we are not. We have in the past over achieved, however at this moment in time with other clubs in much more financial disarray and with inferior playing squads, I believe we are under achieving. We should be higher up the league and with a lot more points and we are all having various debates into why we feel this is the case.

We are not expecting to compete with Leeds, Southampton, Norwich, Charlton and Huddersfield however we would like to take some points from them, but the rest of league one is not all that. I remeber beating big boy Birmingham at home and Stoke away and Sheff Wed etc

That is why the bunker is at times a little negative and anxious it reflects the overall mood. I'm not accepting that it's ok like it is therefore make my voice heard the only way I can on a fans forum.

the problem is Tim, that the negativity is ridiculously amplified beyond all normal levels.

Everybody knows we aren't doing well results wise at the minute.

But some of the talk on here goes way OTT.

I once sat in a coffee room at work and was so thoroughly pissed off because Pools were losing game after game that I decided to support Manure ( they were top off Division 1 and we were 92 places lower, in Division 4 or it might have been League 3 - cant remember) luckily I was working in Leeds at the time and my colleague wouldn't let me. It took them a whole 2 seconds to change my mind but I seem to remember I was quite serious as it was painful at the time.
A number of Poolies are possibly going through a similar experience at the moment.

Pools are the best team in the world to support, so keep the faith.

Imagine looking in a mirror and saying you support Darlo, or talking in a pub and justifying why you follow the red devils, giving a toss about boro, or really caring about any of the other clubs around (apologies to those who have a second club or those for who Pools is their second club).

The German airforce couldnt stop us, the tax man tried and failed a number of times, gibsons dodgy accounting regemes didnt make us fold, their are loads of near misses.

But

The old wooden stand.
Cardiff
Bob Newton
Joel Porter
Billy Ayre
Eiffions goal
Penalties at Tranmere
Buses with Santa on top
Free pasties at Exeter
The watching Brazil - Vimto shout at Mansfield
H'Angus being elected as mayor
Home games
Away games
Tony Parry
The Linacre brothers
The Linaghan brothers
Flash
Brian Honour
Brians goal at Roker Park
The bus convoy to the White Elephant Stadium
Pubs before games
Pubs after games
The Mill House
Paul Dobsons perm - now its getting silly

You know what I mean.

Agree with your post ADG, It still is not going to bring back the stay aways though..

maybe not, but those that still go could, no SHOULD, make more of an effort to 'support' the team more

Ok I agree that we need to show our support to the team on the pitch and not get on peoples back and I like to think i don't do that. And I agree that the personal attacks on him ie Tubby Turner and telling him to F@@k off are unacceptable, he doesn't deserve that. His son certainly doesn't deserve that abuse on the train and those involved ought to be ashamed and apologise.

I still feel we need the bunker to bounce around our frustrations especially as i don't have a cat, or mates who support Pools (Mackem, Toon, etc). I don't work in the town so I can't vent my spleen to like minded people, and I encounter fans from all over the North of England in my job who take the piss constantly. It adds to the frustration, especially as I'm in Manchester tommorow and will get dogs abuse from Man Utd and City fans. It's nice when I can go to my patch in Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Huddesfield and Sheffield and say I don't care because we won. I'm in Leeds the week after next and I can already hear the piss taking after Beckford scores in another defeat for us.

It won't stop me going to the game and i'll still give it back though but it would be nice just for once to silence the gits.

I've got a lump in my throat, and a tear in my eye!


spot. on. though dibbs, the first time I ever went to Pools the thing that smacked me in the mouth most was the atmosphere, and the amount of variety to the songs being sang! Pools were bottom of the football league an all.......

Although I agree with a lot of whats been said in previous posts in this thread, I feel I need to put out a few points...

a) There was no negativity at the last home game against Gillingham as far as I could see/hear. Plenty of support too.

2) There have always been bigger clubs in whatever division we've been in, yet in the past we've always seemed to raise our game and occasionally get a few wins (or even draws).

c) I'm sure every fan in the ground would be far more positive if there was something to be positive about (eg, an end product once in a while)

Part of the reason I love and have loved Pools was always our ability to give the big teams a fright and let them know that they've been in a game. sadly this has been non existent this season.

You missed one Mr ed-t-ball......we are unbeatable, we are unbeatable from 2005/2006 season

bollocks to that

We were definitely beatable that season we got relegated.

Agree with all of that Elvis, except I think you will find that 'that woman who sells the lottery tickets with the Afro' will also still be here with us long after all of the rest have gone.

None of us likes what is going on at the moment.
The problem I've got is that for years and years we weren't very good. Ok occasionally we surpassed ourselves and surprised everybody, including us the fans !!!!!!
We had shit teams, shit crowds and a shit ground.
Our support was hard core diehards.
We got behind the team and you could say we knew our place.

Then HH came along, followed by IOR.
The team improved, the ground improved and the crowds improved.
It was a turning point.
The diehards were joined by others, swelling the gates.
We played open attacking football, we started looking like a serious outfit and were going places, culminating in Cardiff.
We then had the Scott blip, but we were assured that it wouldn't be allowed to happen again.
The crowds held and promotion was achieved.
The struggle for survival in league one started. The momentum was slowing down and the extras who joined in at the beginning of the adventure stopped going.
A spark was needed and, in my opinion, still is.
We are back to the diehards.
We still go up and down the country following the team. Our mileage just to attend a home game is 200, and we go away quite a lot as well.
Our enthusiasm for following the team, although we threaten boycotts from time to time, is still there and probably always will be.
It is the enthusiasm of the people who joined on to the band wagon that has been lost.

Why do we moan then, when just about everything we have witnessed over the years has been improved on. There are clubs up and down the country who would give their eye teeth to be as solvent as us.
The problem as I see it is connected to those long seasons of yesteryear, propping up the league.
WE are now a bigger club than we were, a better run club than we were but whereas we expected nothing in those days, we ave expectations now.
We look at our current position and sense freefall and we don't like it. We are frightened of it.
We know that the momentum in the club will only get back into gear when the results improve.
I will not accept from anyone that we are not in this league on merit....we are, and, with the talent we've got, we can compete.
The big problem at the moment is harnessing and motivating that talent.
Yesterday the support we got from the 400 at Norwich made me tingle, made the hair stand up on the back of me neck.
It was phenomonal, reminding me of away days in the not too distant past.
It proves one thing and that is if Poolies are given something to get behind then they'll get behind it.
The manager and the players know this, we don't have to tell them.
We matched the league leaders in every department, except in front of goal. We showed we were not overawed by the bigclub, big ground, big crowd syndrome.
We shut their crowd up for long spells and played some very good football.
All we have to do is maintain those performances and discussions like this one will be lost in the wind.
We CAN play our part but lets have a big hug with the club and hope that the club make us feel welcome at the table and sort out these anomalies with tickets etc.
I've said this a lot lately and that is the club needs a fanatical fan or two at the club, like HH or Frankie Baggs. People like Paul Mullen.
Somebody in those corridors down there who will forever be asking the question..."what about the fans?"
It's a two way street this.
We will play our part....we always have.
PTID.

Derwent for vice president

Why only Vice-President?

Because he already has Dibbs ear marked for the role of president

NEVER SAY DIE....

Go on you've heard it all before, Last spring as we hurtled towards the trapdoor, The season after the highlight of ALL our poolie lives and many others over the years...

You know what we should go through all the posts on this board and see it all it would make some interesting reading. But come on lads lets face it where would it get us and where did all the moaning and gnashing of teeth get us the last time.. yh thats right nowhere .. whats going to happen is going to happen and it makes not one iota of difference what we write on the walls of this message board..

What's happened to the NEVER SAY DIE attitude .. It seems apathy rules who cares has become the motto of the Vic. and the MillHouse Moaners have exported their maudlin to the rest of the faithful..

Lets get behind the Lads this weekend, lets give them the same 12th man that cheered them to victory on that night back in 2005 when we experienced one of craziest 5 minutes in our lives, at 2-1 in the 87th we score an equaliser . Then even after we missed a penalty in the 90th when Boydy in all his pomp blazed the fooker over the bar we came back and scored and won the match..

On Saturday lets roar them on to an unlikely victory over a "big" club its our day ..
If we don't manage to win at least we can say we've done our best and played our part ...(and there's an added bonus of the fact that we'll get one over on ADG's second team for good measure.. )

THE FIGHT BACK STARTS NOW.....

fook the first team, im so pumped for this match i will take Leeds on meself......... Well i will sing a bit more if that helps?

this reminds me of the battle cries all teams have to put out sooner or later, when it dawns on everyone that the team is in the brown stuff.
What better team to beat than these? The players have got to be at a high level of self motivation for this game anyway and so they should.
Let's face it Norwich and Leeds look like the top 2 now so we won't be playing either of them next season regardless.
Whether that's because we are one division or two divisions apart is another thing - but even getting a draw on Saturday would be a huge boost

Jamie Turner put that rumour to bed himself on IntoTheBlue.

http://intotheblue06.proboards.com/inde ... 602&page=1

To save you having to trawl through the whole thread, this was his post.

"One of my friends has pointed me in the direction of this post and I'd just like to say I wasn't abused or threatened in anyway on my way back from Norwich yesterday. The supporters I sat with on the train home were frustatrated and upset - as we all are at the moment, but it's unjust to say that I was abused and not a fair refelection on those that I had the pleasure of spending time with.
I enjoyed the open and frank discussion we had and their passion and support for the club was a pleasure to see. Regards Jamie"