Looking good at home, Pools need away boost

Having won their last two home games by an aggregate score of 7-1, Hartlepool United clearly have what it takes at Victoria Park to stay out of trouble at the wrong end of the League One table – now it’s time for them to show they have the same quality in away games.

There have been too many hard luck stories for comfort on the road this season, including in the last three games at Millwall, Norwich and Bristol Rovers, where boss Chris Tuner believes Pools played well enough to get some reward.
Trouble is, they got nothing out of any of them, but now they face three away games on the trot and defeat in all of them would render the wins over Carlisle and Southend almost a waste of time.
Turner called Saturday’s success over struggling Southend as vital, and he wasn’t kidding. But fans must be wondering what the result might have been without the arrival on the Vic scene of striker Roy O’Donovan, on loan from Sunderland.

On loan t Southend earlier in the season, he scored a stunning hat trick with goals in 16, 32 and 90 minutes, by which time Southyend’s Alan McCormack had been sent off for a second yellow.
While O’Donovan, Pools’ latest former Cork City import, took the scoring honours, there’s no doubt the whole team deserved the win for a team performance that completely overshadowed a weak Southend side who have now gone ten games without a win.

Turner said that scoring goals at home gives the team as well as the fans a lift and he was delighted with the form of O’Donovan and strike partner Adam Boyd.

He admitted that some of his team’s better performances this season have been away from home, and now he’ll be asking the players to play well AND get results in an effort to build on Saturday’s easy win.
The result means Pools are now six points  clear of the bottom four, but that isn’t enough for them to relax and when they hit the road with games at Yeovil, Tranmere and Southampton before March ends with a home game against Danny Wilson’s Swindon.
With Easter upon us then, they don't want to go into that game as desperate as they were when the Southend match kicked-off.