Gary Liddle reflects on his second Hartlepool United exit and the biggest 'disappointment' since

Hartlepool and Liddle became somewhat synonymous with success during their two periods together, with Liddle earning two promotions during a combined eight-and-a-half-years on Clarence Road.

Liddle sits tenth on Hartlepool’s all-time list of appearance makers having featured 364 times for the club since arriving from Middlesbrough in 2006.

Liddle acknowledged his opportunities at the Riverside may be limited as a youngster before making the jump to the Suit Direct Stadium in August 2006 when Danny Wilson came calling.

He went on to be a huge success for Hartlepool that season, claiming the player of the year award as Pools secured promotion to League One.

The club enjoyed relative security in League One for a number of seasons before Liddle would leave in 2012 to seek a new challenge, going on to feature for the likes of Notts County, Bradford City, Chesterfield, Carlisle United and Walsall before making a sentimental return to Pools in 2019.

The club Liddle left was much different from the one he returned to, having slipped into the National League.

But the defender played his part as Pools earned promotion back to the Football League in the most dramatic of circumstances in 2021’s play-off final with Torquay United.

And Liddle continued back in League Two, making 38 appearances as the club retained its Football League status. It was job done as far as Liddle was concerned, who was out of contract last summer.

Unfortunately for Liddle, however, it would be the end of his second spell with the club after a disagreement in contract negotiations led to the 37-year-old joining South Shields.

And in a recent interview with the Switch of Play podcast, Liddle has detailed his second exit from the club, admitting he was surprised by the offer made to him to keep him at the Suit Direct Stadium.

Liddle said: “At the end of that League Two season, Spike [Graeme Lee] was the manager at the time, and from January onwards he’d spoken to the valuable assets who you’d want around the club.

“He told me in about the March he wanted me around. I wasn’t on a lot of money, I was just happy to be offered a new contract.

“Being on the relatively low wage I was on anyway I was at least thinking it was going to be the same or it might be £50 either way and I’ll be happy, I’d go down the same day and sign. But when the offer came through there was a 25 per cent reduction.

“Straight away it put me down to lower than I was on in the National League when I came back to Hartlepool and it took me aback a little bit.

“I’d played 38 games in that League Two season. I’d spoken to Lee Rust and I’d called Raj [Singh] but we didn’t have a manager at the time because Spike had just been sacked, so the only reply I got was there’d be no negotiations until a new manager was appointed.

“By this time Shields had made contact and had offered me a good deal to go there for a couple of years.”

Liddle added: “I’d have jumped in my car straight away and signed [if the offer was similar to what I was on]. I just didn’t know where the reduction had come from. I’d understand if I was a high earner.

“It’s not a bad word against Raj. As a senior professional he really respected my opinion on stuff.

"When [Dave] Challinor left he was asking for my advice on the new manager. He had a selection of managers who he’d made a shortlist of and we went through them together and he asked my opinion on them, so he respected my opinion.

“But when the contract offer came through I just didn’t expect it more than anything.

“I’d heard a lot about Shields anyway through their recent success and I went down and met them and was shown around the place and told plans and we thrashed out a verbal deal then.

“They [Raj Singh and Lee Rust] were a bit surprised, I don’t think they quite expected it. But they both wished me well and thanked me. I say I didn’t have a choice, but it was certainly made a lot easier through the contract offer.”

Despite his exit from the club, Liddle has gone on to gain another promotion on his CV having been an ever-present in the Mariners’ promotion to National League North last season.

The defender remains a mainstay in Julio Arca and Tommy Miller’s side this season but admits he will always have one eye on Hartlepool’s success.

Speaking exclusively to The Mail during pre-season, Liddle detailed his disappointment in seeing the club relegated back to the National League last season having seen so many of the promotion winning squad move on elsewhere – something which continued with the exit of Nicky Featherstone this summer.

But the defender is hoping the club can get things right this season and make a return to the Football League.

“Nobody wanted to see the club get relegated,” he told The Mail.

“It’s been said before but we worked so, so hard to get us back into league football after four years of being in the National League. So I know first hand what went into that promotion campaign both on the field and, just as importantly, off the field as well.

“Looking in from the outside last season there was a lot of change, obviously the manager left and a new manager came in which didn’t work out – there was more or less a new squad of players came in and that promotion team, as good as it was, was wiped away.

“That was the disappointing thing and I think that’s the main disgruntlement of the fans,” he added.

“Sometimes that can’t be helped, teams will come in and take your best players like they did with Oatesy and like they did with Timi and people like that, so new players have to come in.

“But for one reason or another it obviously didn’t work.

“We had a good squad of players there, and a good staff, and it was just disappointing to see everyone go in their own directions a little bit and it probably had a massive part to play in the downfall of the football club last year.

“I keep in touch with a lot of the lads. You just hope that John and Sweens and Mark can gather some momentum and they can have a good push at getting the club back and getting the fans back on side again.

“Raj has obviously put the club up for sale now and we’ll see what comes of that in time.

“Hopefully the club gets on the right foot this season and come next April-time they can be in touch with those play-off places because, going back as a 33-year-old as I did, it was by far the happiest time of my career getting the club back in the league, knowing how hard the club had tried over the previous years and how much the fans desperately wanted it.”