Does anyone know whether there are plans for replacing the live match commentary on Pools Player or are we going to be stuck with the BBC Radio ?

I'm sure I read something saying that it would be available through the club website. Hope so because I much prefer listening to a thoroughly biased account of the match.

Are you able to listen to the BBC Radio Tees live commentary whilst in "foreign parts"?

I have it on good authourity that there is about to be a revamp of the web site and that the new one will include most of the items previously on Pools player including the commentary at No charge.The EFL contract ended now we have been out of the league two years.

Are you able to listen to the BBC Radio Tees live commentary whilst in "foreign parts"?[/quote]

Yes I did last season.

Everytime I tried BBC Radio Tees I got "this program is not available in your area"

Go to the National League section in the BBC Sport website or the app if you are on your phone. If you are abroad use a VPN if needed (I don’t think it is).

Every game is available, usually with a choice of each teams local broadcaster.

For me it's fingers crossed the club does something itself, the BBC don't capture the games with the same passion as Mark does and then there are the constant breaks for updates from elsewhere which. Although I understand the BBC as a regional broadcaster you can't beat the focus from within your own club and for that I don't mind paying my dues.

Just move here man.

Are you able to listen to the BBC Radio Tees live commentary whilst in "foreign parts"?

You couldn't when we were in the league unless you used a proxy but now you can, except when they have Boro as the main match and put us on DAB. Much prefer the coverage from Mark Simpson though. Partly because him and the co-commentators are massively biased so you feel more involved, you're getting a commentary from other Poolies. Other reason is that the BBC Tees coverage is very poor at times - sounds like uninterested recent recruits doing it on phones sometimes.

Would have been happy to keep paying but I'll donate the equivalent to the club or the Trust one way or another.

Yes, see my post it’s the Tees commentary you get through the BBC website.

Wrote about this for When Saturday Comes a few years ago. Apologies for it being so long but I can't do a link instead because they have a pay for archive now.

Niche broadcasts from lower division football clubs are nothing new. In the ‘50s my Grandad picked up a phone, attempted a BBC accent and delivered live commentaries on Hartlepool matches for local hospital radio. When I asked him why he’d stopped he said, “The matron banned it, she said her patients had already suffered enough.”

It was the early years of widespread internet before the chance to listen to an account of matches direct from Pools came up again. Almost as soon as the club had a website it started to offer a text commentary and sound followed soon after. It was free.

After a series of mergers, league wide deals and name changes the website now shares a common format with every other League club. It offers a video and audio streaming service called EFL PlayerHD. The package includes filmed highlights which combine glimpses of skills soon destined for a higher division from winger Nathan Thomas with alarming defensive lowlights from a range of centre halves that haven’t settled in yet.

It isn’t free and the video roundups alone wouldn’t justify even the fairly low subscription fee. They’re probably just a dry run for the live streaming of full matches that clubs, and the EFL, could charge much more for.

What makes me and other exiles easy meat for the monetizing gurus is the full live audio coverage of every match with a commentary team provided by your club. For Pools this means the media officer Mark Simpson and a co-commentator, usually with inside knowledge of the game. Over the last few years this has included a number of injured players but my favourite temporary sidekick was Shaun the bus driver. Presumably given the job because he was there anyway or because nobody else could face it at that point, he spoke as much sense as other ‘experts’ and offered wise advice on the best roads to use when travelling south – “A1 rather than M1 every time”.

None have become serious rivals to the regular co-commentator Brian Honour. Brian brings humour and the intense commitment that he displayed over ten seasons and 319 appearances for Pools to the commentary box. He excelled as a skillful wide midfielder but his ability to wear down full backs with sheer determination and a sometimes brutal approach to the physical side of the game endeared him to fans just as much.

Listening to him alongside Mark, you feel like you’re witnessing the match through the eyes of people who care as much as you do. Even during the recent battles to retain our league status their positivity was undiminished. 3-0 down with 15 minutes left? “These aren’t that good, if we can nick one soon the last ten could get interesting.” Lost four on the trot? “It’s about confidence, we’ve got some canny footballers and we could go on a run, a scrappy win could set us off.” This season’s 6-1 collapse at Stevenage? “Hard to explain, we were the better side in the first half.”

But that passion is a problem too. You also need a reasonably accurate account of events. Adrift at the bottom of the league some fans became disgruntled with the coverage. Mark Simpson was frequently referred to as Lord Haw-Haw on one message board. A tad harsh, but the owners did appear to be insisting on some positive spin.

Desperate to find out just how bad we had really become I turned to the comparative neutrality of BBC Tees and Ivor Nash, who turned out to be called Ivan Ash. His meandering commentary style irritated me and by the second match I realised why – Ivan was barely concealing his amusement at our ineptitude. The persistent note of detached derision in his voice really rankled. He didn’t give a monkey’s toss.

His co-commentator Eddie Kyle, a professional dour Scot and former assistant manager of both Pools and Darlington, spotted that we needed better organisation at the back and a tough-tackling midfielder to add some bite and break up play. This chimed with what most fans were saying but it turned out that Eddie said it about whoever lost every week. He’d have delivered the same withering assessment about the vanquished outfit in a death-match between Bremner’s Leeds and Rattin’s Argentina.

The combination of gentle mockery and repeated, scathing exposure of the team’s inherent weaknesses was too much to bear. They seemed to be enjoying our plight. I went back to the club’s own offering. Over the years I’ve suffered enough to know I need a sliver of hope.