Preview: Hartlepool United v Oldham Athletic

By Albatross
December 24 2004

Shall we talk about the Weather now? Hartlepool United are due to take on Oldham Athletic at Victoria Park on Boxing Day, and hopefully the wintry conditions predicted won't scupper what's usually one of the best attended games of the season.

Weather permitting, Pools will be able to look for revenge against a side that has already beaten them twice this season - and in neither game at Boundary Park did Pools even come close to doing themselves justice. At Victoria Park though, Pools will be expecting to do considerably better.

Oldham's season has not been especially distinguished. Currently they sit in 17th place, some seven points behind Pools but also the same number of points ahead of the relegation places. Their 28 points have come mostly at home; on their travels eleven games have yielded just two wins, two draws and nine goals from eleven games. The wins came at struggling Stockport and more surprisingly at Bradford; defeats at the likes of Torquay and Port Vale hardly indicate that Oldham are a real threat to Pools.

However having beaten us twice they will feel that they do have hopes of getting something out of the game, and Neale Cooper will no doubt not be underestimating our opponents. After all, Kevin Betsy is likely to be up front and feeling that he has a point to prove to the fans and Cooper....

Leading scorer though is Chris Killen, with eleven goals; no-one else has scored more than four, and Betsy has scored only three. Killen however is struggling with a groin injury and is rated only as 50-50 to play. Jermaine Johnson, scorer of four goals, is facing a long spell on the sidelines with a knee ligament rupture, meaning that Betsy will most likely be partnering Scott Vernon up front. However Dean Holden will return after a suspension, and Brian Talbot has also strengthened his squad by bringing in Alex "Son of Steve" Bruce on loan from Blackburn.

As far as the team news for Pools is concerned, Ben Clark is available for selection again after taking part in the reserves defeat against Sheffield United, and Darrell Clarke is also getting closer to first team action having played in the same game. In fact, the only member of the squad currently out of contention is Mickey Barron, who will be out for several weeks yet. Having struggled with injuries most of this season, Neale Cooper will be very pleased to have an almost fully-fit squad for the busy festive period.

It does present him with a slight selection dilemma though. Does he restore Clark to the side in place of Michael Nelson? Nelson has missed out on a few games since handing in a transfer request, but certainly played well enough against Wrexham to suggest that he's getting back towards his form of last season, and it would be very harsh to drop him. In fact, it would be very hard to drop anyone after a 5-1 away victory, and you'd be hard pushed to single out anyone who didn't have a decent game: so I suspect that assuming there are no niggles or illnesses, we'll line up with the same eleven that ended our poor away run. Clark will probably have to be content with a place on the bench for the moment.

Time for a prediction then, and it's hard to see beyond a Pools victory. Oldham's form is patchy at best, while Pools are going to be full of confidence; add in one or two important players missing for our opponents and there could be a festive treat for the hopefully large Boxing Day crowd. 3-1 to Pools, with Boyd, Porter and Tinkler getting on the scoresheet.