Hartlepool United squad ‘the strongest it’s been’ admits manager Dave Challinor as he discusses selection problems following Wrexham draw

Pools currently sit third in the National League table at the midway point in the season and have been in and around the play-off places for the majority of the campaign so far.

Injuries and suspensions have caused Challinor to rotate his squad slightly in recent weeks as the side continued to apply pressure at the right end of the division.

And the Hartlepool boss has highlighted the strength in depth in his side at the moment as he’s finding it difficult to name a starting line-up and bench without leaving some key players out.

Tuesday night’s draw at Wrexham was a perfect example of that as he said: “We’ve picked our bench based on a few different things.

"Tom White was still a little bit short so we need to prepare for potentially replacing him and Jamie [Sterry] had obviously just came back from injury and it was Lidds’ [Gary Liddle’s] second game in three days having not played for months before that.

"You’ve got to pick subs to cover eventualities and unfortunately that means some big have missed out.

"20 players travelled to Wrexham and we were without Feaths [Nicky Featherstone], Luke Williams, Luke Molyneux or Henrich [Ravas] as well as the two who haven’t travelled [Josh MacDonald and Claudio Ofosu].

"The squad is the strongest it’s been since I’ve been here, it’s really competitive and everyone has the same objective.

"They know they’ve got to perform and they’re under pressure to do the right things and make our jobs as difficult as possible and they are doing that.

"It’s difficult to pick a team and a squad and that has to remain the case.

"We’ve got a lot of Tuesday night away games with another four coming up. When you take into a count a Saturday game and then an away Tuesday game, you’ve got to look at your squad.

“We’ve got a strong, fit squad and if we do have to mix it around a little bit and give people opportunities and dangle that carrot in some instances, then we will do.”

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