Everything Graeme Lee had to say on Newport County as Pools travel to Rodney Parade looking to bounce back from Bradford City defeat

Pools are in action on Friday night when they face Newport County, looking to bounce back from their home defeat to Bradford City in midweek.

And Lee will looking for signs his side can kick on once more after failing to win back-to-back home games following the EFL Trophy semi-final heartache little more than a week ago.

But Pools come up against a Newport side who are finding their form as James Rowberry’s men claimed their third straight win in Tuesday’s victory over Carlisle United.

It was a result which moved County into the top three in League Two ahead of tomorrow night’s clash.

Pools were narrowly beaten in the reverse fixture when a stoppage time goal from Dom Telford ensured the points returned to South Wales.

And here is what Lee had to say on the trip to Rodney Parade.

Newport are in good form. This promises to be a difficult night, doesn’t it?

They’re a very good team, they’ve been up and around it for quite a few years now so we know it’s going to be a tough night but every team you come up against in this league is tough. Everyone can beat everyone on any given day.

It will be another tough night. It’s been a tough week in the sense it’s been Saturday-Tuesday-Friday so it’s about managing bodies and getting them ready but trying to get them going and getting them smiling.

Nobody likes a defeat. That [against Bradford] is my first defeat at home but we’ve had a good run of games and we still should be in a good place so it’s just about getting that positive vibe back around the place.

They’re on good run of form, what do you expect from Newport?

They’re a well organised team. They’re very narrow through the pitch. The distances from each other are really close so them first and second balls are vital. They’re like 2-2-2 through the middle of the pitch so they’re effective and they’ve got good quality players so they’ll start attacks off from deep and they’ll rotate.

They’re a well organised team and there’s a reason why they’ve won their last three games because they've got good players within that organisation and we’ve got to try and match them and try and utilise what we can in areas where we think we can hurt them.

Given the run of games, have you noticed any signs of fatigue?

We haven’t had much chance to be around the place [to notice it] because it’s been game, game, game.

We have to keep pushing and driving the lads forward. There’s a squad of lads there who are working hard every day in training.

Look, the Leyton Orient performance we were flat and you can see why after Wednesday night [against Rotherham]. There was moments on Tuesday night where we had some good moments in the game and it was nowhere near like the Leyton Orient performance, it was probably more down to us not taking the two chances we created.

But the second half I felt as though were just coming into the game until their goal. The majority of the half was played in their half of the pitch which is what we always try and do so the positives are still there it’s just the two goals obviously sucker punched us and the response after that I didn’t enjoy but we’ve got to move forward.

Three of the next five fixtures are away to the current top three. It’s a tough run of games?

It’s a good run of games, it is. They’re all tough. But we’ve shown what we can do. We’ve shown we can go up against top teams. We look at the performances against Tranmere and Sutton and we’ve got results off them so there’s no reason why we can’t go to Newport and get a result.

Was this game a target in your mind in terms of how you have managed and rotated your squad this week?

I don’t want to focus on one game over another it’s just you have to look at the bodies and how they are.

They other night there was the likes of Omar who has played a lot of games and it was probably one game too quick to bang him on for another 90 minutes and look to get the best out of him so it was an opportunity for the other lads to come in and try and effect the game and tomorrow night is the same.

Two of those who came in were Martin Smith and Marcus Carver, did they do enough to impress?

Both of them came in and affected the game in their way.

It’s tough, they both haven’t played many minutes for quite a long time. The hard side of it is when you lose a game you take away from what the lads have done.

Carvs, you know what you’re going to get, he’s going to work hard and harass centre halves and press from the front and help the team get on the front foot.

He had two great opportunities - it was a great save from the keeper on the first one and then he gets across the front on the second one but just doesn’t get the right contact. If he scores one of them it’s a different conversation.

Smudge has come in and him and Feaths played some lovely football and then he kept the ball at times. You could see he fatigued later on in the game and a few passes went wayward but apart from that his performance from his first game coming in was good.

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