Cant see a full strength team turning out for the WA game like - might be more trialists involved ? and some from last weekends game by all accounts (heard 3 have been invited back). Hoping to see the likes of Darcy etc involved aswell as Burton etc

Sometimes players flounder under the system their manager demands or are played out of their favoured position. Sarll seems to be looking for a certain type of player and, who knows, might unearth a gem or two who are desperate to play to his system.
As usual it is wait and see time.

We Gunna be struggling to see a full strength team for August 10th at this rate of Recruitment.

Is it still a no excuse season? now Hartleys driftwood are history.
Imagine there will be a few beauties coming out

Not enuf STs sold

It's still the " last chance saloon " and surely Raj totally understands that. On a positive side I am personally happy with the current signings particularly Campbell. I reckon we will sign a decent keeper this week and a couple more decent players before the end of the month. I am not saying we will win the league but I do believe we will get a top 7 finish. Kev you have always said " the proof will be in the pudding " and I agree 100%.....but I genuinely believe we are about to turn a corner in terms of performance and results.

Certainly hope so.
I take hope from how poor standard this division was last season.
Last chance saloon for sure.
Looks like we going into the season with a small squad which means we Gunna have to cut down on the amount of injuries we normally get.
Ya got to live in fairy tale Land if anyone thinks we getting over 40 games each out ov Dodds n Mancini.
UTP.

I hope your wrong Kev but I think your going to be proven right. I would be happy to get even 30 games each that would be amazing considering the injuries last season.

how many last chance saloons have we been in. we,d be all alcoholocs if we had gone into all of them. you can never pln for not having injuries and its sods law the smaller the squad the bigger chance of players picking them up. out of dodds and mancini i feel we,ll get far more games out of the former than the latter if everything is equal. without knowing either player i feel i,d prefer dodds next to me in the trenches.

Just been told: 2 was Nathan Kabeya, 7 was Ibrahim Jalloh, 8 was Aaron Braithwaite from Grimsby, 15 was Jaiden Drakes-Thomas recently at Dover.
Seems to be lots of punts being looked at there...

Jesus, I've heard of casting the net wide but some of them have so little experience they're like contestants in a talent show. First prize - a wet weekend in County Durham. Are Pools planning to start an U-21s side?

Reminds of of years ago when local teams advertised in Mail “training starts Wednesday new players welcome”

Age old story though isn't it? How do they get experience if they don't put their talent on show and hope someone takes a punt?
Nowt at all wrong with these types of trials imo and we're not the only club that holds them. At the end of the day we probably won't sign many if any at all.

When John Beck was manager at Cambridge he used to have about 30 trialist in for a week and each day an train and play a game and the poorest ones left then in the end may offer contracts to one or two.

I see nothing wrong in giving trials all I’m pointing out is out of about 15 players in this game I believe only three were Pools youths. I’ve never known Pools to have so many trialists in one game.

could be a good thing even if just one is signed and they prove to be good.

do not have to do that now as if you want a game especially on sunday morning just take your boots and shin pads down and you,ll get signed on at least or told to call yourself a certain name if cautioned or sent off.

With it all going quiet on the signings front maybe trialists are the way forward. Espicially if the budget has become tight.

whats alarming however you want to look at it is - not a single one of them are time served pros ? usually 1 or 2 will be a lad coming back from an injury or someone around the late 20s early 30s looking for another crack at it having being released by other clubs in the NL/NLN etc... but yeh this is an advert for an U21 side gathering. Maybe we are looking to bulk up the academy squad a bit. Maybe DS had a plan with trialists and wanted only young lads etc. As we have seen before with the likes of Cullen, Cook etc that being time served with league minutes under your belt means nothing at this level (if you are shite you are shite end of).

in the past we have signed players who did ok who were not time worn pros.

very true - its just first time ive seen us not field a someone on trial who hasnt been around the game for a bit - or at least had a few games in the division. In DS we trust and im sure there is reasoning for all this and why these lads are in pushing for a contract. The management team aint mugs

Whats alarming is if we dont get our fingers out by the end of september we will be struggling to put a team out, injuries will happen thats for certain. Bulking up the squad with kids wont win us anything unless they are bloody good.

So we may be in bother in nearly 3 months time if we don't make any more signings in the meantime, hardly panic stations?

I mean, there's this one lad Krampesh says was playing last week - Ibrahim Jalloh. Might be English, might be Danish, might be German, might be Belgian Seriously, 4 football websites can't agree. Anyway, in 2021/22 he was playing for Three Bridges in the Isthmian League. In 22/23 he was at Haywards Heath Town in the Southern Combination. Seems he was withiout a club all last season... and Pools have given him a trial? Based on what?

Its panic stations when your not ready for a new season and your team has about 3 weeks of friendlies to prepare and we have zero strength in depth still with just one keeper who is deemed nowhere near good enough and a manager who said he wanted to do his business early. All the hallmarks of once again relying on loans and thats worked well over the last couple of seasons.

Who's to say we won't be ready in over 4 weeks time though? Assuming everyone is fit we have the basis of a decent starting 11 (bar a goalkeeper), on top of that we have cover in attacking and midfield areas but not so much in defence.

GK. Dodds. Waterfall. Parkes. Fergy
Mancini. Sherron. Hunter. Campbell
Grey. Mani D

Subs. Burton, Mani O, Stephenson, Wallace, Fev, Charman, GK

Further signings will be imminent no doubt. And if we need loanees then as long as they're good enough who cares, the likes of Cass on a season long loan worked well and Gateshead seem to do OK with them.

He was at Three Bridges again last season scoring 24 in 35 games. They’re level 8 so the equivalent of a Northern Prem Div 1 side like Stockton, Dunston, Hebburn etc. This was their leaving post for him:
https://x.com/threebridgesfc/status/179 ... OG_piqQObg

Just comparing the trialists to the ones we had last season which were Luis Longstaff (ex Liverpool academy, 30 games in Scottish League 1, 30 games in Scottish champ), Dillon De Silva (ex-QPR academy, 17 games in the National League. Now at Sutton via Torquay and Wealdstone), Grayson (games in League 1 and 2 for Grimsby, Barrow, Oxford, Stockport. Now at Gateshead), Mancini (30 games Angers 2, ex-Burnley academy, 2 games in League 1 for Accrington).
There's a bit of a 'pedigree' difference between the 2 sets.

We need 4 signings before the first game to have a chance. The bench you've listed is 3 defenders, a sick note who was awful last season, Featherstone who is transitioning to become a coach, Charman and Dixon.
Realistically we're looking at this:
GK/Dixon
Dodds (Stephenson, Darcy)- Waterfall (Manny O) - Parkes (Burton) - Ferguson(Burton)
Hunter (Featherstone) - Sheron (Wallace)
Mancini (Charman, Campbell, Storey)
Campbell (Charman, Storey) - Mani D - Grey (Charman, Storey)

We're lacking depth all over apart from defense, where the back ups are nowhere near the standard of the starters.

But the starting 11 that I've named looks not too bad imo, and we've still got 4 weeks and more players to bring in I'm sure. Definitely like to see a couple more through the door this week though.

Maybe those on Saturday are not the only trialists, Proven players could be training with the first team.

So out of about 18 players 2 are on the list, 1 wont be ready for the start of the season and 1 is basically going to be a coach, nowt like having a team already together learning the pattern of play in friendlies. Ready to go from day one afterall we have had around 3 months now to get this right this season.

There is indeed but thanks for the update. Never looked on X. Pools wouldn't normally go looking for players in the southern non-league competitions - probably because there's dozens of Step 3,4,5 and 6 clubs on their doorsteps.

Who's not going to be ready for the start of the season? Fev is registered as a player and still rated by many (but not me) on here, and I'm sure out of the 2 on the list I'm sure they'll both give their best if needed. I'd imagine e at this moment in time that fitness is prioritised over tactics by the coaching staff. There's also a few kids who'll be knocking on the door for game time so over 20 full time pros on the books.

Exactly what i was on about - All of last seasons trialists seem to have ended up at decent level because they can operate there. We missed a trick also not grabbing Grayson aswell. Given the lads from WBA and Norwich are similar to what we have had before with young lads etc... but dear me taking on lads from london pub teams. Scouting network thinks they are playing football manager doesnt he. Wish we could of given Ndjoli a trial back when !

Dodds n Mancini!?
Not guaranteed to start n last a full game at Yeovil!
Any players starting not 100% fit will soon get found out and further deplete the squad.
We have a history these last 6 years off hanging back major style when recruiting managers n players.
A theory to save a few penny's on wages which generally results in failurism.

Nobody's guaranteed to start and last 90 minutes of the 1st game at any club are they?
Last season we had Askey in place before the close season and this season Sarll was appointed what a week or 2 after the season finished - hardly 6 years of history in late or slow managerial appointments then?

At least 6 have to.
New regs
Sarlys one off early appointment has eat into the players recruitment.
Results are fact that apart from DC the overall recruitment ain't good while tin pot clubs leave us behind.
Thread closed from me.
Catch ya probably on anutha thread.

I think we may see a few more lads in on trial for the game tomorrow ? maybe some of those from last week as i quoted 3 had been invited back. Would hope by at least the end of the month we have a few more plus GK through the door. Think we can all agree that if that doesnt happen we will be going into the season with a small squad an undoubtedly 2 of our best players returning from big big injuries.

but sarll seems to want it that way even if the majority of us including me do not. we have been around the club much longer than him and know it will be a miracle if he has a full squad to pick from the first game of the season. his get out of jail card is we can sign new players at any time when league clubs cannot but we,d have to be lucky indeed finding another armstrong or kemp in this period or our own player that costs us nowt but will improve things. does the manager actually want a small squad but financial restraints force that on him and is only repeating club policy.