FEBRUARY 2014 and David Mirfin was heading out of League Two. Fast forward a year and he’s back in the division and doing his best to avoid leaving it again.

The centre-half was a mainstay in Scunthorpe United’s promotion charge into League One, as records galore were broken.

But this season has been an injury write-off so far and last week he moved to Hartlepool United to try and help them avoid relegation.

His initial month-long spell started with a defeat at Portsmouth as Pools, after two successive impressive performances in a run of improved fortunes, gave a tame show.

They lost by one goal, were disappointed in the nature of Matt Tubbs’ winner and left the south coast with the gap to safety up to nine points after a reduction to seven from last week.

Time is running out for Pools and, with 17 games to go, they are looking at needing ten wins to stay up. It’s some ask for a team with five victories from 29 outings.

But Mirfin knows what it’s like to win week in, week out. The Iron last season went 28 games without defeat.

“Sometimes it’s all about grinding out results in this league and it might not always be pretty, we did it last year and hopefully I can help bring that to this team,’’ reflected the 29-year-old, who bears a striking resemblance to former Pools centre-half Ben Clark in both looks and on pitch demeanour.

“I’ve no worries about coming here, I enjoyed last season in this division a lot, probably more than when it’s been a struggle in League One.

“But last year was good and I’ve enjoyed this game. Bottom of the league may be frowned upon, but there’s some very good players in this league.

“I’ve said to a few of them here that compared to our team last year, and I know it may sound silly because Hartlepool are at the bottom, but there’s not much difference.

“All it’s about is consistency and having someone up top who can score plenty of goals regularly. But get lads chipping in and it takes the pressure off.

“Be consistent, concentrate for 90 minutes and you will win games. If I can bring a bit of that to the team then hopefully it can help.’’

He added: “We switched off once and it cost us. The gaffer touched on and it if you have three little lapses in concentration like that then it can be costly.

“This season for me, I was injured three days into pre-season and it’s probably the longest I’ve ever been out in my career, so it’s a bit frustrating.

“When the gaffer came in for me, it was pretty much a no-brainer to come in and get some games.

“He reminds me of my first gaffer at Huddersfield, Peter Jackson. He’s honest, tells you what he wants and will tell you if you aren’t doing it. After working under a few different managers, I think it’s the best way.’’

And Moore will have said a few honest things afterwards to his players. They were on the back foot from the off, could have gone behind after only 38 seconds when home centre-half Joe Devera pushed a free-kick wide from six yards.

From then on, there was some defending that was as organised as it was frantic, as controlled as it was panicked.

But Pools stayed in the game despite the pressure. The team of two months ago would have been three-down by half-time.

At the other end, they offered little. Scott Fenwick flicked a shot over on the turn, Michael Duckworth sent a left-foot shot wide.

Pompey keeper Paul Jones was as quiet as Scott Flinders at the other end, but Flinders was beaten after an hour.

Dan Butler had time to cross from the left, and Matt Tubbs stole a yard by getting across Dan Jones to head in.

From then on, Pools never looked like levelling. Marvin Morgan had been a disappointment and out of sorts before he was replaced by the equally disappointing Marlon Harewood.

Mirfin, with over 400 games to his name, added: “We have come off disappointed, with the build up to the goal, a bit of sloppiness and we lost concentration.

“Sometimes you have to be patient, and they had a lot of ball in our final third without Scotty having much to do.

“We were pleased with how it was going, we spoke before the game that they would have their share of possession and the crowd would be behind them and we negated them.’’