The dressing room view on playing in front of empty stadiums as Hartlepool United push for promotion
and live on Freeview channel 276
Pools – who have won six straight home games – sit third in the National League table and are well placed in the promotion push ahead of tonight’s trip to eighth-placed Eastleigh (KO 5pm).
But what is it like for the staff and players to be pushing for promotion without the sense of excitement from fans on a matchday?
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide AdChallinor told the Mail: “It’s really tough [to get a sense of excitement], from a player’s perspective, them being on social media and things like that, you can get some notions of where you’re at but within the changing room and in the training ground, it’s a case of getting on with it.
"It can work in your favour as well, don’t get me wrong.
"With the way football is at the moment your adulation doesn’t get too high when you win and you don’t get too low when you lose because things move on quickly.
"The great run we’ve had hasn’t been massively reinforced by 4,000 people screaming at you and you’re coming away from games on a massive high.
"There are things like that where it has been a bit easier but we all play football to win and as much as we feel that winning feeling amongst ourselves, the highs of winning become a lot higher and I guess the lows become a lot lower when you have as many supporters in the ground as we have.
Advertisement
Hide AdAdvertisement
Hide Ad"It’s also the nature of our support as well where we know that the nature of our support and what we do has a huge impact on the people in the town so in that scenario it makes it more special to know that we can potentially do something for them,” said Challinor ahead of the Tuesday teatime trip to Eastleigh in the National League (KO 5pm).
Pools travelled down to Eastleigh on Monday with the kick-off time brought forward giving Pools the best possible preparation for the rest of the week ahead of the visit of Yeovil on Saturday.