Nicky Featherstone gives honest Hartlepool United relegation verdict

Featherstone is on the verge of suffering a second relegation to the National League with Hartlepool having been part of the squad who experienced a similar fate in 2017.

Hartlepool’s captain has been in and out of the team under manager John Askey since his arrival in February and could be set to make his final appearance at the Suit Direct Stadium this afternoon with the midfielder out of contract in the summer.

But although the odds are firmly stacked against them, Featherstone has insisted his side must do their job against Barrow and hope for good news from West Sussex where Crawley Town face Walsall.

“That’s the way you’ve got to look at it. When you’re in these situations, until we are down, you’ve got to believe there’s a chance,” said Featherstone.

“We’ve got to do our job and then we’re relying on other teams to help us out so it’s almost an impossible task, but not impossible.

"But it’s just disappointing the way it has happened and got to this stage.

"We were within three points of Crawley going into that game and our home form suggested that we would put in a better performance than we did and for whatever reason we just didn’t show up. We didn’t show the urgency to get back into the game.”

In addition to the defeat against Crawley, Featherstone has highlighted the disappointing performances and results in Hartlepool’s back-to-back away games against Newport County and Salford City after they had been on an eight game unbeaten run prior.

"It’s tough,” said Featherstone.

"The performances from the last three games haven’t been good enough and they’ve come at a time when we didn’t need them to happen.

"The Stevenage point took us out of the relegation zone by a point but the three performances which have come after that have been pretty poor. So it’s really disappointing.

"It starts at Newport but then you think: is it just a blip? We had another game on the Tuesday to put it right but for whatever reason the last three performances have not been there.

“It’s out of our hands now. We’re relying on other teams.”