Hartlepool wait on offers with Paul Hartley confident on further additions

Pools lost Timi Odusina, Omar Bogle and Neill Bryne to several League Two sides this week. While the club have received a cash injection for each of those departures, it does leave Hartley with some considerable gaps to fill in his squad with less than a month to go until the season begins.

Last season’s top scorer Luke Molyneux also headed out the exit door after he completed a permanent switch to Doncaster Rovers.

Hartley has already been busy on the transfer front making five new signings in Kyle Letheren, Euan Murray, Alex Lacey, Mohammed Niang and Jake Hastie but still look thin in certain areas of the squad, particularly in attack. That’s something the manager is confident of quickly rectifying.

Hartley said: “We’ll be busy. We’ll have a strong squad. We’re going to bring some good players in. We’ll hopefully have a couple of additions before the weekend but we’re working really hard.

“We know the areas that we need to fill. I can assure the fans that they are working hard behind the scenes to bring good players into the club. We know we need to bring two or three strikers in.

“We’ve made offers for two or three players. We think we can get two or three players over the line by the weekend so it is exciting times for the club.

“By July 30th, I am sure we will be there. We will have a strong squad and a lot of talented players in the group so it will be a busy next few weeks for us as a football club and hopefully the Hartlepool United fans will be right behind us.

"The Chairman (Raj Singh) has given me great backing. He knows what type of player we are looking for and it's not easy to get a player over the line. 

"I can assure everyone we are working so hard to get the right type of player in and the right type of character."

After flying home from their pre-season training camp in Portugal yesterday, Pools return to pre-season friendly action on Tuesday night when they make the trip to St Mirren.