Preview: Hartlepool United v Yeovil Town

By Albatross
September 2 2005

It's an unfamiliar lunchtime kickoff for Hartlepool United; tough on the travelling fans from Somerset then, but can we get our first home league win of the season in our first ever meeting with Yeovil Town?

To say Yeovil haven't had a great start to the season is something of an understatement. They still seem to be struggling to adapt following last season's promotion. It took them three games before they scored their first goal, and they have yet to record even a point away from home. The only real bright spot came when they dumped Ipswich out of the Carling Cup.

Gary Johnson's mood wasn't helped by delays in sorting out the international clearance for recent signing Pablo Bastianini; the Argentinian forward was only cleared to play in the middle of the month, and notched his first goal in their defeat at Swindon last Saturday. Overall things aren't going well, and their Bank Holiday weekend saw a home defeat at the hands of Chesterfield to add to their 4-2 reverse at the County Ground.

Johnson has tried to stregthen the leaking defence by taking Fulham's Liam Fontaine on loan for a second time; he had a spell there last season and has joined until January. Not much other team news at the time of writing for the Glovers, although Arron Davies will not be taking part as he's on International duty.

Pools have a similar issue that will mean at least one change from Monday: Neill Collins is again on duty for Scotland u21, meaning there's a vacancy in the back four. Ben Clark may be the obvious choice to step in, but I have a feeling that Carl Jones may make his first team debut; he was included on the bench against Scunny, and didn't take part in the reserve game in midweek. Clark may still have a role though - the general feeling is that he did fairly well when he came into the midfield, so he may be asked to play the holding role there alongside Sweeney or Bullock. Tinkler may have got more time under his belt for the reserves, and may be fit enough for the bench - but I don't expect him to be put straight back in to the first team just yet. Thomas Butler is back in the frame and is likely to be recalled though after missing out on the Bank Holiday action - Llewellyn will probably drop to the bench.

After a poor start to the season, Pools need to start turning things around and failure to beat a side that has yet to record a league win would not go down well. Arguably this should be our easiest game so far, although Yeovil fans would no doubt disagree; I'll go for us to sneak the win 2-1, Boyd and Proctor to get the goals.