By Albatross
January 12 2004

It's time for a roundup of news and views from the world of Hartlepool United. Half the fans seem to have evaporated, Shuker is staying - for another month at least, we're runoured to be looking at a Pop Music great, and Marcus Richardson's move is finally a done deal. Richardson's move had looked in doubt towards the end of last week, with some haggling going on about the clauses in the deal. While Lincoln were happy to give Pools a percentage of any sell-on fee, the sticking point was a disagreement about fees to be paid should the Sincil Bank club be promoted or reach the playoffs. However, all seems to have been settled one way or another, and so after 15 months (three on loan!), 29 appearances and six goals Richardson leaves us. It's looking like good news for Joel Porter though - after impressing in recent games he looks likely to be offered a deal at least until the end of the season.

Chris Shuker's loan was extended just before Saturday's match, and the Scouser showed exactly why with possibly his best performance so far in a blue and white shirt. Maybe the extra time will also help change his mind about a permanent deal at the Vic.

Meanwhile, there's some annyonace about the number of home fans in attendance against Peterborough. Even allowing for the fact that there were several hundred fewer away fans than against Barnsley, some 800 fewer Poolies actually saw us beat Peterborough than lose to Barnsley. While the Boxing Day game usually sees a good attendance and you might expect there to be a few less, in between the two games we recorded a 2-0 away win at Oldham and then took over 9000 to the away Cup Tie at Sunderland - and not only that, put in a dcent performance against the Mackems. So where have the missing 4000-odd gone?

In many ways there's no point me preaching on this point - the committed Poolies that go to every game possible are not the problem. The problem is how to persuade the thousands in the town who only seem to come out of the woodwork for the occasional big game to turn up on a more regular basis, and certainly on the pitch it's hard to see what more Pools can realistically do. Ken Hodcroft must be tearing his hair out: Saturday's win saw us climb back into a playoff spot, we're performing much better than expected in the league, have run a couple of sides from the top end of Division 1 close in the cups, and yet the vast majority of people in the town seem disinterested in the events at the Vic. There are probably more people who claim allegiance to the Mags and Mackems in the town than follow Pools!

Neale Cooper still has lattitude to sign players though, and most recently has been taking a look at Scott Walker if the papers are to believed. Over the weekend it was reported that the former St. Mirren and Dunfermline defender had signed a six month deal - something which Cooper has since denied. Whether the Centre Half and force behind 60s Popsters The Walker Brothers is likely to sing "Make it easy on yourself" as part of the half-time entertainment remains a matter of pure conjecture.