Richard Money discusses Hartlepool United tactics, defensive adjustments and new boy Harvey Rodgers

Harvey Rodgers in action for Pools at the weekend.

For much of the season Pools have operated with a back three.

It was certainly the formation favoured by former manager Matthew Bates, who only picked a four on three occasions this season, and it was continued under the temporary stewardship of director of football Craig Hignett.

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But Money, despite claiming he would stick with the status quo, adjusted things slightly at the back, allowing for a greater emphasis on getting more players in the attacking third at National League North Leamington in the FA Trophy.

The system worked perfectly. And key to that, according to Money, was new boy Rodgers, signed a little more than 24 hours before the trip to the Midlands.

"I thought he was outstanding, very good," said the manager, assessing the performance of his Accrington Stanley loanee.

"He hasn’t played for 10 months so that performance was outstanding.

"On days like that you need your back four and your goalkeeper to be big and strong and they were.

"That was a big help, Harvey coming in made us more physical - we look a lot bigger at the back."

Money could potentially call on the services of skipper Andrew Davies and Myles Anderson at the back this week, as a number of players recover from slight knocks.

Having options at his disposal is no bad thing for Money, though, who had a youthful looking 16 in Warwickshire.

Money continued: "It was really important not to change it too much but bringing Harvey in and with Myles being injured it gave us a chancre to look at a back four.

"We tried to keep the rest in front similar to what it has been the last two weeks, with three, one and two as oppose to two, one and two in the previous two games.

"We tried to keep it as consistent as we could and they tried hard, did some good things at times, I think they know we need to do a lot better than that. But a win is a win.

"You can see on days like that, the ball is being played long by the goalkeeper on a gusty, windy sort of day, your back four has got to stand up and they did. "