John Askey believes Hartlepool United have this advantage over relegation rivals Crawley Town, Colchester United and Harrogate Town

Askey has done well to help boost Hartlepool’s survival hopes since his arrival as manager having gone eight games unbeaten.

It’s a run which sees Pools outside of the bottom two ahead of what is likely to be a crucial week for the club in the battle to avoid relegation from the Football League.

The culmination of which sees rivals Crawley visit the Suit Direct Stadium next weekend but, prior to that, Pools face back-to-back fixtures on the road, starting with this afternoon’s trip to Newport County.

And while much of the anticipation is surrounding the meeting with Crawley in seven days time, Askey admits his side need to pick up points heading into that fixture if they are to continue their push for survival.

"Obviously the Crawley game is going to be huge but we’ve got to get points before then,” Askey told The Mail.

"There’s a good opportunity on Saturday and if we can do that then we move onto the next one.

"I just drill into the players that it’s always the next game, so we’ve got to put everything into the Newport game. If we do that, everything takes care of itself.

“The aim of the game is to get safe,” Askey added.

"The sooner we do it then we can all relax. But until we’re safe then it’s going to be edgy and nervous.

"But I think the advantage we’ve got is that one or two people had written us off and clubs who thought they were safe are now starting to worry.

"Crawley had been on a decent run but we’ve still managed to go above them so it shows how well we’ve been doing and then you’ve got other teams coming into it like Colchester and Harrogate who probably didn’t think, with the points they had, that they would get dragged into it.

"So we’re probably in a better place mentally than most teams, but whether that will show at the end of the season we’ll see.”