Paul Hartley reacts to Hartlepool United's heavy defeat to Blackburn Rovers in the Carabao Cup
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The Championship side eased into the second round with a 4-0 win over a below par Pools.
Scott Wharton opened the scoring just after the half-hour mark when he powered in Tyler Morton’s corner before Dilan Markandany was denied by the foot of the post just before half-time.
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Hide AdPools barely threatened the Rovers defence in the opening 45 minutes and were given a mountain to climb just two minutes after the restart when the impressive Bradley Dack slid in Tayo Edun’s low cross.
And the home side added a third soon after when Tyrhys Dolan found space on the left and he was able to open his body and find the far corner.
Markanday grabbed a goal his performance deserved when he found the bottom corner from Dack’s clever lay off with Hartley admitting it was a difficult night for his side.
“It’s a learning curve. Playing against good players, if you make a mistake they’ll punish you,” said Hartley.
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Hide Ad“We were beaten by the better team but the second half was disappointing, especially for about 25 minutes.
“We go in a goal down at half-time through a set play. I know we didn’t have much play ourselves, but I thought our shape was good and our organisation, we were difficult to break down and we said at half-time just to stay in the game at 1-0.
“Then we lose two quick goals. Two really soft goals. After that it was always going to be difficult and it was about just trying to keep the scoreline down a little bit.”
Hartley made seven changes to his starting XI with one eye on Saturday’s trip to Northampton Town in League Two.
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Hide Ad“We had to freshen it up because we’ve got an important game on Saturday, but I expected a little bit better tonight,” he said.
“They had a difficult evening. When you’re playing against good players they'll punish you if you make mistakes and that’s certainly what happened to us.”