The Poolie Bunker

1-0 up 17 mins, Luke Charman.

Kian Foreman on loan from us equalises for Hebburn

Is there a lot of youngsters in the starting line up?

Your Pools to face Hebburn Town this evening:

1. Trialist A
22. Darcy
5. Kouogun
15. Penman
3. Trialist B
11. Charman
21. Thornton
14. Sheron (c)
28. McKeown
30. Bondo
19. Popov

2-1 up Kouogun,

3-1 Popov

3-2

2-3 now. Slightly worrying we cant keep a clean sheet. Still, I'm sure he knows what he is doing.

In a way Clarke's tribute to Kevin Keegan, best defence is to out score the opposition.

First friendly for me tonight and a new ground. Nice little set up at Hebburn. First half was fairly even maybe just shaded by the hosts but second half was much better from pools. The trialist keeper didn't look the best but the left back Mcadam looked pretty good. Popov looks to have good movement across the front line, Bondo looked raw but some nice touches, McKeown was bright at times. Hard to really judge to much in these games though. Quite surprised we only made 1 sub all game!.

Same for me. More than a bit surprised not to see more of our squad considering there is no way that 11 will be close to Pools' starting 11 in the NL. Thought it was strange when Will Harris spent the half-time warm up doing keepie uppies!

It was good to see Popov and Bondo in action. Popov has loads of energy and is a handful, but his goal was handed to him on a plate by a Hebburn mistake. Charman took his goal well but didn't do a lot else.

At the back, Kouogun was was excellent as usual and Campbell Darcy had a good game. Agree that the trialist left back did pretty well.

The midfield was a bit meh. Sheron was busy but we all know his limitations - he's got a reliable passing range of 10 yards. The younger lads did ok. Think we are still crying out for a powerhouse box-to-box midfielder.

Hebburn were decent and Kian Foreman's curler for them was the goal of the game.

500 fans, about half of them Poolies.

thats fine until we don,t and then the knives will be getting sharpened up. a lot of fans want total perfection. top defence and highest scorers.

Clark mentioned after the Spenny game that he wanted to start getting 90 mins into the legs of everyone, so this will have been what he has down as his 2nd XI, then his first XI on Saturday all playing 90 mins.

Benn
Ilunga
McNally
Gibson
Penman / Hunter
Ecclestone
Miley
Nolan
Harris
Hugill

Was the trialist left back Kyle McAdam?

Yes it was and he had another good game at left back.

I thought so too.

I thought McAdam was one of the better performers as well

He came on for the last half hour at Spennymoor and looked solid then as well.

I forgot to mention Brad Walker came on as a triallist for the Moors…

Hope Tommy Miller isn't falling for that. The NLN's not walking football either.

He gave away the penalty.

it was a mistake. the trial was supposed to be for the walking football team.

I see a Pools U21 side won 3-2 at Ashington last night, would be nice to read a match report but difficult to find anything.

I found this in the Northumberland Gazette:
"Ashington completed their preseason campaign on Wednesday night, succumbing to a goal at the death in a 3-2 loss against Hartlepool United U21s at Woodhorn Lane.
The Colliers – who played some decent football in spells - conceded two strikes in the first half after giving away possession. They trailed as early as the eighth minute to a header at the far post, but got themselves back on terms just past the quarter-hour mark with a good finish from a trialist.
The visitors regained the lead in the 23rd minute before Josh Gilchrist levelled with a left-footed shot from the edge of the area.
Ashington then missed a number of great opportunities to edge ahead, and paid the penalty as Hartlepool netted a third with the last kick of the game when a corner was played to the far post."

Not much - but likely more than we'll ever hear from a Pools point of view. Th OS is still in the state Raj's regime left it nearly 7 months ago.

Thanks for that and agree, the OS is sadly lacking ATM.

find getting official info on pools has got worse over the last few years.

It was only £2 a pint of Cruzcampo lager in the ground.

Well done Hebburns commercial team.

Until a Media Officer is appointed nought will change, it’s still showing vacant on the OS.

They announced the other day that they have appointed a company called urban zoo to deal with all the digital media and streaming stuff, so we should see massive improvements. According to the guff, they work with Aston Villa, Everton and Bournemouth at the moment. Looks like Landon is keeping the professionalism going.

It takes time to clear up the mess Sing left behind.

Id say so far Smithy doing an excellent job.

Keep the Faith everybody.

United are back
United are back.
Hello.
UTP.