By Albatross
November 9 2002

Chris Turner may have gone, but Pools continued their good away form with a win over Exeter - our 5th away win of the season. Colin West is off to a winning start then, but will he still be in charge for the Southend Cup Tie? Colin West sprang a surprise or two for his first game in charge of Pools: Micky Barron returned to the Right Back slot, and on the left Brian Barry-Murphy started his first game for Pools in place of Mark Robinson. The formation though as expected stayed at the familiar 4-4-2.

Pools opened the brighter, with Humphreys seeing a long-range shot go wide, but the game soon degenerated into a dour, niggly game, with a number of fouls from both sides preventing much in the way of flowing football.

The next meaningful attempt from Pools took until the 16th minute to arrive, when Williams put a close-range effort wide of the post, and then Pools had a bit of a let-off when Alcide - making his first appearance for Exeter having only signed this week - mis-hit from inside the area and sent his shot wide when he really should have done better.

Barron found his way into the Ref's notebook on 20 minutes, having infreinged once too often, and Exeter had a spell of play which saw Westie, Lee and Taff having to be on their guard.

Pools best chance of the half arrived on 29 minutes: Smith got a header in from inside the box, and Miller in the Exeter goal was forced to save low down. Miller was proving to be a good last line of defence, making other saves from Tinkler, Richardson and Clarke, while at the other end Taff had to deal with an effort from Alcide.

The second half was only three minutes old when Exeter went ahead: RENIER MOOR slotting home from close range after being fed a pass from Alcide. Pools were rattled, and Moor had another chance blocked by Westwood, and then Roscoe put a shot wide as Pools tried to weather the storm.

They did start getting back into it, and Richardson had a chance on 55 minutes when Williams found him running through: but the big Striker could only put the ball over the bar. Meanwhile, Roscoe was putting in a number of crosses and corners as Exeter tried to increase their advantage. Moor and Alcide both had chances that they put wide.

Pools struck back on 62 minutes; they won a corner on the right, and Smith put in an inswinger that found the head of MARK TINKLER who headed home to level the game - his eigth of the season. Pools continued to press, with Smith putting in some good corners, and just four minutes later it was another one of these that saw Pools take the lead. Smith took one from the left this time, the ball found the head of Darrell Clarke who headed back across goal, and MARCUS RICHARDSON forced the ball home from five yards out. It's the former Torquay man's second goal since signing for Pools, and it's starting to look like the Gulls should have tried harder to hold onto him. Still, their loss is our gain....

Exeter pushed forward to try and get an equaliser, but Pools were holding on; Thomas then committed a bad foul on Paul Smith and saw yellow.

West bought on Adam Boyd for Marcus Richardson, and then Istead for Paul Smith, and although both sides did have chances, there was no further scoring and so the hundred or so Poolies in the 2800 crowd were able to celebrate Colin West's first game in charge with a win.

Elsewhere, Rushden beat Darlington and are four points behind in second; there's then a seven point gap to Bournemouth - who lost to Wrexham - and Torquay, who beat Bury today and have a game in hand after last week's postponment against Kiddiminster. Kiddy lost to Carlise and have dropped to 6th.

Not maybe as comfortable a win as we'd hoped for, but nevertheless a win: and credit must go to Colin West for keeping the players focussed on the task in hand after a turbulent week. Our next fixture sees us once again at Roots Hall to take on Southend, this time in the FA Cup. Will Colin still be in charge for that game? Only time will tell.....