Dave Challinor reveals his plans for Blackburn Rovers midfielder Tom White during Hartlepool United loan spell

The 23-year-old midfielder made his Pools debut in last week’s 2-0 win over Solihull Moors at Victoria Park after joining on a temporary deal from Championship outfit Blackburn Rovers and played again in the 2-1 defeat to Eastleigh on Tuesday.

It’s the first time White has been back home playing football in the North East since leaving Gateshead in 2019 but it has been a difficult past six months for White, who had a loan spell at Bolton earlier in the season.

As a result Challinor knows Pools will have to be careful with him.

Challinor said: “We’ve got to be careful with him because he hasn’t played a lot of football, we’ve spoken to Blackburn about him and we played a practice game with him on Saturday where he played 45-minutes and felt a little bit leggy so especially with us playing Saturday, Tuesday, we need to be careful.

"We’ll have to manage what he does through the week in order to get him through games.

"As he’s said, it’s been a tough six months for him and in football you have to make decisions.

"Sometimes things don’t play out how you see them, he’s obviously gone from playing regular football at this level then the draw of a Championship club is always difficult.

"In hindsight he’d probably say he wouldn’t change it but he’s gone from being a regular in men’s football to playing under-23s.

"He got himself out on loan last season and had a really good spell but the next step up for him hasn’t worked.

"Whether that’s down to circumstances or in his case and injury, he’s in a similar situation to Luke [Armstrong] who he knows well.

"It’s back to him playing football, enjoying his football and being back home hopefully part of a successful team.

"For him it’s about getting back to where he was previously and doing what he loves doing because he’s still a young lad and he’s got his career ahead of him.”

Pools host Yeovil Town at The Vic on Saturday afternoon in the National League.

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