Big Sam - suspended

By Charlie Summerbell
April 27 2011

Two games to go and five points to win if Mick Wadsworth’s Hartlepool United target is to be achieved … it’s going to take some doing for a team that is winding down the season and isn’t having the best of luck at the moment.

Pools finish their Victoria Park season against promotion hopefuls Bournemouth on Saturday, and the season as a whole comes to an end the following weekend with a game which means nothing as far as the League table is concerned at Charlton.

But players still have their contracts and their pride to play for and Wadsworth, as well as the fans, will expect nothing short of 100 per cent in both matches.

They got that at Southampton on Easter Monday, but fortune didn’t go their way.

The turning point came early in the second half when Sam Collins was sent off for an alleged tackle on Ricky Lambert, who scored from the spot, and Jose Fonte scored a late second.

in front of 24,000 fans, Pools had chances to level between the goals and played more than just a supporting role in the game. But Wadsworth told the Northern Echo: "They didn't deserve that defeat. We set up to work against an expected onslaught. I felt the sending-off was disappointing - the red card was ridiculous.

"Sam says there was no contact at all, he is very angry and upset and I understand that. At one-down with ten men you think oh dear, we have dig in now and we had two, three excellent chances to get something.

"I'm proud of them. We have got stronger and stronger this season and got more belief in each other than we had earlier in the season.

"We could have buckled in the past, but we have grown stronger. This game highlighted the weaknesses in the squad and where we have a lot of strength.

"We could have made it 1-1 and taking chances has been a problem for us.

"Referee's decisions change games

"It drives you mental the whole balance of decisions. It's not right. There you go, what can you do?”

Not a lot, because no matter how good the standard of refereeing is – some say it’s OK, others say it’s a disgrace to the game – their decision are always right, even when they are wrong.

But at least Pools can play these last two games without the sort of pressure which has marked the previous three seasons – they are not going to go down no matter what the results, and in the circumstances that in itself is an achievement for Wadsworth at the end of a see-saw season in which he was plunged in at the deep end early on before slowly but surely stamping himself on the squad.