John Askey's worrying verdict as Hartlepool United are heavily beaten by Bromley

It was another miserable afternoon at home for Hartlepool as they were heavily beaten by Bromley, who cruised to a 4-1 victory.

Despite a recent upturn in form, Askey had suggested he would find out more about his team against tougher opposition in the shape of Bromley and Hartlepool’s resilience lasted just five minutes before Bes Topalloj was able to pick out an unmarked Michael Cheek who made no mistake from 12-yards.

Pools responded reasonably well and enjoyed plenty of possession without testing goalkeeper Grant Smith before Cheek stunned the home crowd with his second of the game when reacting quickest to a loose ball in the area from a corner.

Emmanuel Dieseruvwe gave Hartlepool hope early after the restart following a delay to the second half due to a floodlight failure at Victoria Park.

But Dieseruvwe’s delight was quickly followed by more despair for Pools as Ben Krauhaus restored the Ravens’ two-goal advantage to, effectively, kill the game.

There was still time for Bromley to cap their performance with a fourth and rub salt into the wounds as former Pools striker Olufela Olomola raced almost the full length of the field before converting as Askey’s side fell to a sixth home defeat in all competitions this season.

"We give ourselves a mountain to climb again,” he told BBC Radio Tees.

"We start the game and you end up a goal down after a few minutes through poor defending, as has been happening all season. We had spells where we were knocking the ball around well, but at home you’ve got to penetrate a little bit more than what we were doing. Then we concede a second goal which is, again, poor defending.

"We got a goal back and then we get done again. So, again, defensively we were shocking. We’ve looked better in the last few games – Manny [Onariase] going out hasn’t helped, but we’ve got to be a hell of a lot better than that."

And when asked how he can improve his side’s defensive frailties Askey, worryingly, appeared to concede he and his staff are unable to do so before highlighting a lack of experience as a potential issue.

"We’ve been trying all season, haven’t we? So obviously we can’t,” he said.

"It’s a bit like last season where you end up with 19 and 20-year-old lads playing centre-back. These lads might go on to have good careers, such as Zak and Kieran, but you need to be able to dip them in and out and we’re not able to do that.

"I’m not putting all the blame on them, but we’ve seen from last season. You’re trying to rely on lads who are still learning their way.

"If you look at other teams, they’ve got more experienced players who are dominant. They might not be the best footballers in the world but they make less mistakes. So it’s frustrating at the moment.

"But I’ve got to take responsibility for results. It looked promising the last couple of games and we just get one player going out and all of a sudden you’re back to square one.”