Horwood - hopeful

By Charlie Summerbell
September 12 2012

Hartlepool United have been dealt a few harsh footballing lessons in the early stages of the season, and in their next two games they will be given stern tests of their ability to learn from them.

As boss Neale Cooper tries to find out why some of his younger players seem to go down with cramp so easily, difficult away games at Bournemouth on Saturday and Preston three days later also give him and his players plenty to think about.

After managing to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory at home to Carlisle last weekend, Pools certainly need something from these two games – their away record saved them last season when they struggled at home, but so far there haven’t been many signs of them doing a lot on their travels, though to be fair they have only played two away games so far.

The 5-0 hammering at Crewe in the League Cup was one of those days while the 2-0 loss at Notts County could have been better.

Neither Bournemouth nor Preston are setting the League One table alight, but they are higher up than Pools and clearly neither game will be easy.

Cooper was not too critical of his players after the Carlisle game and he told the Mail "It's hard to criticise because they played so well against Carlisle for 70-odd minutes, a lot of the stuff was really good.

"There was some great passing and movement but in the chaos of a few minutes everything changes.”

Defender Evan Horwood admits: “We have to manage the game better.

“We’ve played a lot of games between us now and maybe we were getting a bit excited going for a second goal, we had the ball so much.

“Instead of doing what we did, we should have been looking at nicking a second.

“We are good at keeping clean sheets and we can do it.

“At 1-1 and down to ten men we should still have seen it out. There was still only ten minutes to go.

“Overall I think the fans will be pleased with how we played, even though the result went against us. It was as good as we have performed for a long time, even going back into last season.”

Hopefully, the squad will learn ... quickly.