The demise of Hartlepool United as Dave Challinor prepares his return with Stockport County

Those are perhaps two of the more overt feelings to have followed after Dave Challinor confounded Hartlepool United supporters little over a year ago when leaving the Suit Direct Stadium.

Having secured hero status, Challinor dealt what has been a devastating blow to Hartlepool when making the decision to step back down to the National League to take over at Stockport County just 15 games into his first stint as a Football League manager.

Challinor picked the club up from the floor, guided it through the unsteady waters of the COVID-19 pandemic and took them to the mountain top of promotion back to the Football League with a day the town of Hartlepool will never forget at Bristol City’s Ashton Gate Stadium in June 2021.

But little over 12 months on, as Challinor prepares to make his return to the place he called home for over two-years, The Mail looks at what might have been, what Challinor can expect and why it has gone wrong since his departure.

When Raj Singh appointed Challinor back in November 2019, the prospect of being a stabilised Football League club once again, within the space of two years, seemed improbable, and yet the former Tranmere Rovers defender delivered.

Challinor took as much of a gamble as the club when taking over at Clarence Road. It was the first time in his career he had strayed out of the confines of his home in the North West having spent the majority of his playing career at Prenton Park, before moving to Stockport, with the bulk of his managerial career coming at AFC Fylde.

Challinor achieved three promotions with the Coasters before joining a Hartlepool side languishing somewhat in mid-table in the National League, five points from a play-off spot.

Fast forward little over four months and Challinor had won seven of his 19 league games, drawing the same number and losing just five, as Pools edged to within three points of the top seven before the season was curtailed due to the pandemic.

It was by no means a start to suggest pastures new, but it was steady enough. Steady was okay in the sense that this was a club which had found itself ingrained in decline, and almost out of business, following its relegation from the Football League in 2017.

But if the club were to return, steady would have to progress - something which again seemed unlikely after Challinor’s side were humbled 3-0 by Woking in December 2020.

And yet what would transpire in the subsequent six months would cement Challinor’s place in Hartlepool folklore and would be why his picture still remains adorned in the club’s 1908 lounge at the Suit Direct Stadium.

Challinor steered his side to 17 wins over the final 29 games of the regular season with just five defeats including a remarkable 16-game unbeaten run, the joint-fifth best of the club’s history, to catapult them into the National League play-offs. The rest, as they say, is history.

But it wasn’t just the results on the field which garnered the support of the fans. It was Challinor’s connection with the town and its people. It’s often said you don’t ‘just go’ to Hartlepool, you have to want to go. It’s not a town you pass on the road to somewhere else. It’s unique in that sense.

The bond between Challinor and the town was none more evident than during the club’s promotion parade. As the 47-year-old chugged down his beers aloft an open top bus, the masses, who said to hell with the social distancing measures, serenaded his name.

There were flags waved, while the tinge of burning from the various blue smoke bombs lit wafted around the town. This was a new wave, and a welcome one. Hartlepool had their club back.

“The big thing for me was the bus parade and seeing the amount of people who came out,” said Challinor after agreeing a new three-year deal with the club in September 2021.

“From little kids with their dad’s, to the older generation waving from their windows. It makes it easy to fall in love with Hartlepool.”

But that love would not last much longer.

"Speculation comes either in good times or bad times. That performance [on Saturday] is the type of performance that gets a manager sacked, never mind a manager moving to another club and the club wanting that manager,” Challinor said after his side were thumped 5-0 by Leyton Orient in October 2021.

“As soon as, or if, there is any news, whether that’s from myself, the club, then obviously the press will be the first to know. But there is no news at the moment.”

It was the statement which sent an unnerving jolt throughout the town of Hartlepool. Something felt amiss. And so it would prove as just 39 days after agreeing a new contract with the club, Challinor left to return to the North West with Stockport.

It was a bitter blow. But not only that, it was a confusing decision. Challinor had often reminisced about being able to manage in the Football League, a feat he achieved with that incredible penalty shootout success over Torquay United.

And having made an exciting start to life as a Football League manager, the club 10th, just four points from the automatic promotion places in League Two from 15 games, it made the decision all the more difficult to comprehend.

“It was very important for the club to secure the correct contract with Dave that is manageable, but that also puts another absolutely critical piece of the jigsaw in place for years to come,” said chairman Singh when agreeing a new deal with Challinor.

“We’ve discussed the longer-term vision and there is so much more that this club can go on to achieve with the right plan and people.”

So why, then, did things unravel so quickly from that contract signing?

Challinor’s demeanour had changed as he cut a more frustrated figure during what was a hugely condensed pre-season campaign following their promotion success. No sooner had their celebratory hangovers worn off, were players back on the job.

But Challinor’s squad was not the same, or more importantly, his firepower had gone. Rhys Oates and Luke Armstrong were paramount to Hartlepool’s promotion campaign scoring over 30 goals between them. Armstrong was on-loan from Salford City but opted for a move to Harrogate Town instead of a return to Hartlepool, while Oates secured a switch to Mansfield Town.

Defeats at Spennymoor Town, Gateshead and Blyth Spartans angered Challinor as he was left irritated by a lack of a breakthrough in being able to bring in suitable Football League replacements. Mark Cullen, Mike Fondop and Olufela Olomola did arrive as goals became an issue for Challinor’s side, despite their bright start to the campaign.

Broken promises? Financial concern? You can say we will never know, but Challinor’s parting statement when he left the club, given where the club now finds itself, is one of increasing intrigue.

"I'm not going to use this message to throw mud at anyone or point score. Nor am I going to attempt to justify the really tough decision I've had to make,” he wrote.

"Hopefully in time, the truth and real facts will come out that may help you understand more why I made that decision.”

Challinor’s wife, Kate, had also suggested there was ‘much more’ to the move than just money, while Singh contested he was, rightly, unwilling to persist with a manager who was not 100 per cent focused on the job in hand.

“We believed we were building something special with Dave and this squad - matched by the magnificent support the team has received, home and away,” said Singh.

“Ultimately, it is crucial that the manager of our club is 100 per cent committed to the job. Dave had made it clear he wants to leave.”

It was a messy break-up. One which remains deeply entrenched in supporters’ minds, especially when you see what has happened since Challinor’s exit.

In the 50 league games since Challinor walked out to join Stockport, Hartlepool have won just nine. Attendances have dropped. The team has been overhauled. That feel-good factor entwined with the town appears broken. There is fan unrest. There are questions unanswered.

At the time of his exit there was anger and confusion. Since then, supporters appear to have acquiesced with many, seemingly, forgiving of his decision to move on from the club.

The ‘what might have been’ element to Challinor’s exit is, perhaps, the most gut-wrenching part of this story. Challinor had not only turned around the fortunes of the club but he had made others take notice, such was the interest in his services.

While, naturally, it was not perfect - there were issues with the away form for example, the fear factor instilled at the Suit Direct Stadium was one we have not seen for years gone by, since the likes of Sheffield Wednesday would fear their trip to the North East almost 20 years ago.

One of the more visceral moments came in Challinor’s final home game in charge of the club. At 2-0 down to Harrogate at half-time, Hartlepool were applauded and cheered off the field as though it was they who were in front. They came out and scored three times in seven minutes to win the game 3-2 in the second half.

Challinor and former physio, Ian ‘Buster’ Gallagher, on what was also his final day with the club, shared a special moment with supporters at the full-time whistle. It was one of those ‘if you could bottle it’ moments. The kind of unity which has been missing between club and supporters since.

Hartlepool are now onto their third manager since Challinor’s departure. Each have highlighted the need to re-establish that ‘fortress’ nature at the Suit Direct Stadium. Each have failed. Since that win over Harrogate on October 23, 2021, Hartlepool have won just five of 25 league games on home soil. A far cry from what Challinor was able to achieve.

"It’s been tough,” Hartlepool captain Nicky Featherstone, who alongside Ben Killip are the only players still at the club from Challinor’s first game in charge, told The Mail.

"The form in that time has been tough. I was speaking to Buster the other day and he said we haven’t won at home at 3pm since his last game. I didn’t know that. So it’s been tough.”

But while that 3pm hoodoo was broken in the recent win over Grimsby Town, some 53 weeks on from the Harrogate success, Featherstone again conceded: “It’s tough for us as players and it’s tough for the fans.”

Whichever way Challinor’s exit is perceived, his return with Stockport will be emotive. There is no one size fits all. This was a combination of factors but over a short period of time which led to his exit. The overarching emotion, however, is that Challinor’s exit has, seemingly, led to the demise of Hartlepool United following an error-strewn period of instability with managerial appointments and player turnover.

Where just over 12 months ago there was such hope and optimism emanating around the town of Hartlepool, now, under the shadow of Challinor’s return, the impact of his ruinous departure can be laid all to bare.