John Askey's verdict on Hartlepool United's 2-1 defeat at FC Halifax Town

Hartlepool United manager John Askey gives his initial reaction to the 2-1 defeat to FC Halifax Town at the Shay in the National League.

Transcript

00:00 We've done well to get ourselves back in the game at 1-1. The goals, as you can see,

00:07 were very avoidable. As I say, we got ourselves back in the game just before half-time. So

00:14 you think second half we're going to come out and have a right go and it was the complete

00:19 opposite. For five or ten minutes, we just didn't clear our lines and allowed them to

00:27 put pressure on us, resulting in a corner, which they've scored from. So, again, it's

00:34 just poor. It's really poor from us not to do simple things. You try and hammer it at

00:42 home, which you do every week, for some reason it doesn't seem to go in. But one thing they

00:51 did, setting off after they conceded, they had a go. We could have scored two or three

00:57 and their keepers made some great saves. The finishing needed to be better. I thought on

01:05 another day we'd probably have scored another couple. But we've got deficiencies and we

01:13 know that at the moment it's costing us. There's some players out there who are playing well.

01:19 We've got a centre-forward there who's as good as anybody in the league and scoring

01:24 goals. So obviously that's a positive. I thought Joe coming in, I thought we looked stronger.

01:31 The goals that we conceded are off set-pieces where people are given jobs and probably whether

01:39 it's through inexperience, it probably is. It's cost us. But we've still got to do better.

01:53 The only positive is, as the game went on, they kept going. They kept having a go. If

02:03 we'd have dropped their heads and gone under, obviously that would have been a massive concern.

02:09 That was the one thing you could say. They kept going and on another day they'd have

02:13 got someone out again.