By Eggy_Poolie
July 11 2006

Here is the second of our League 2 previews for this season. Today we will be focusing on Bury, Chester, Darlington and Grimsby Town

Bury

Bury made it tough for themselves last season and only just staved off relegation finishing 6th bottom of the league and to help improve matters they have introduced Marc Goodfellow from Grimsby to their squad. Bury play their home games at Gigg Lane which holds just under 12 000.

Manager Chris Casper assisted by Martin Scott will surely be looking for an improvment on last seasons performances and to push Bury into the top half of the league table. Their main threat comes through S Whaley who bagged 7 goals last season

Pools Online prediction: Top 10

Chester

Chester finished 15th last season and will be and manager Mark Wright has brought in Ashley Westwood, Graham Allen, Ricky Ravenhill and Glen Cronin in to help improve on last seasons finish. Also in the transfer market Tom Curtis has joined Notts County and former Poolie Marcus Richardson has joined Weymouth.

Chester play their home games at the Saunders Honda Stadium which holds approximately 6 000 fans.

Last season Chesters main thread came from R Lowe who managed to score 10 goals and D Asamoah who managed to get 8.

Pools online prediction: Mid-table

Darlington

Well this goes without saying. Pools biggest rivals were unlucky last season and just missed out on the League 2 play-offs. Manager David Hodgeson had brought in Michael Cummins and reintroduced Barry Conlon to the Darlington set up making Darlington favourites to make it into the playoffs

Darlington play at the Darlington Arena (or the George Reynolds Arena as it is better known) and thanks to Darlington Borough Council it now has a maximum attendance of 6000. Yes thats right-6000.    

Last season Darlingtons main threat in front of goal was G Ndumbu-Nsungu who scored 10 goals but it must be said with the introduction of Conlon and Cummins Darlington may look very strong in attack

Pools Online Prediction: Playoffs

Grimsby

When ever the town of Grimsby is mentioned in Hartlepool the first thing that comes to most people minds is 8-1. However Grimsby were rather successful last season and lost to Cheltenham in the League 2 playoff semi-final. Grimsby have been rather quiet in the transfer market but new manager Grahame Rodger has allowed Marc Goodfellow to join Bury on a free transfer.

Grimsby play their home games at Blundell Park whcih holds 10 000 fans.

Grimsby's main threat infront of goals is Michael Reddy who scored 14 times last season and Gary Jones who bagged 13