Graeme Lee has confidence in his 'hard to beat' Hartlepool United side ahead of trip to Colchester United

Pools saw their three game winning run brought to an end with Saturday’s 1-1 draw with Sutton United at the Suit Direct Stadium but Lee’s side have not tasted defeat in the league since January’s trip to Bristol Rovers seven games ago.

It’s been a timely run of form from Lee’s side as they have eased any fears of slipping into a relegation battle, instead replacing those fears with renewed optimism as Pools moved into the top half of the table at the weekend.

Last time on their travels Pools earned just their second away win of the season with Omar Bogle’s strike against Crawley Town and Lee is confident his side have what it takes to continue that momentum on their travels.

“If we’re at our game we can beat anyone in the league,” said Lee.

“We’ve played second and fifth in the last two games and it gives us a bit of a benchmark as to where we are.

“But we need to be hard to beat. We’ve got good quality going forward and can hurt teams.

“We won three games on the bounce and that to me looks like we think we’re good players and we don’t have to do the ugly side. We have to do the ugly side to be good players.”

Tonight’s trip to the Jobserve Community Stadium is the first of three away games for Lee’s side after the original fixture was postponed due to a number of positive COVID-19 cases within the Pools squad in December.

It means Pools will travel in excess of 1,000 miles round over the next 11 days with games at Walsall and Harrogate Town to follow.

“Lets deal with Colchester on Tuesday night [first],” Lee told The Mail.

“But we’ve got to be a lot better than what we showed in the first half [against Sutton].

“We’ve got to make sure we're hard to beat going away from home.

“So we’ve got to get our heads back on and not feel sorry for ourselves and see what happens.

“But I'm confident with what we’ve got in this squad whether we’re home or away we can win games.”

Pools could be missing as many as five players who featured in their most recent away trip to Crawley with fullbacks Jamie Sterry and David Ferguson still doubtful after missing Saturday’s draw with Sutton.

Sterry sustained an injury in training last week with Lee keen to take caution over his return so as to ensure the former Newcastle United defender does not miss more games than necessary.

Ferguson has spent the weekend recovering from a non-COVID related illness while Joe Grey also missed the draw with Sutton having failed to recover from an injury picked up in the win over Tranmere Rovers.

And Lee was handed two fresh injury concerns on Saturday when midfielders Bryn Morris and Joe White were brought off.

Morris suffered a knock to the ankle while White has had a scan on a wrist problem.

Lee told The Mail: “There’s been a lot of games and fatigue kicks in but it’s about how you approach games and how you manage things.”

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