Hartlepool United manager Craig Hignett reveals shocking stat that led to defeat at Dagenham and Redbridge

Along with the individual errors that led to The Daggers scoring three times at Victoria Road, Hignett revealed a stat from his side which was alarmingly high compared to the previous matches in which they had gone five games unbeaten.

Pools conceded as many goals over the 90-minutes in East London as they had all season away from home – but that wasn’t what caught the Hartlepool manager’s attention.

“The goals we conceded on Saturday were poor and we’ve had a look at the video because there were things that happened on Saturday that hadn’t happened in the previous five games,” Hignett admitted.

“It helps to highlight it and show the players that what we’re saying, we’re not just making it up, it has happened.

“In a normal game, you expect maybe four or five times people will let their runners go. On Saturday, we had 21 clips where that happened – 21 times people let their runners go and that’s the reason why we didn’t play so well.

“The distances that we played, we were very stretched as a team so we’ve highlighted that again this week and done some work on it so hopefully that won’t happen again.”

Hartlepool will be looking to bounce back from their disappointing defeat at Dagenham when they welcome Dover Athletic to Victoria Park this Saturday (3pm kick-off).

Pools could move above Dover in the table and potentially into the play-off places with a win.