Hartlepool United 2 Yeovil Town 0

IN JUST 48 hours, the contrasting nature of Hartlepool United has been there for all to see.

While on Saturday they fell to a slack and sloppy defeat at Crewe, yesterday they were untroubled in comfortably seeing off Yeovil at Victoria Park.

Pools are now 13 points ahead of fourth bottom, while seven adrift of seventh in a season of contradictory fortunes, performances and emotions.

Strikers Joel Porter and James Brown got the goals, as Pools eased to home win number 11 and their first victory over Yeovil at the fourth attempt.

"It could have been far more than the two we scored, but we didn't take our chances,'' said manager Danny Wilson. "In the second half we got the second goal which was a killer for them.

They left things open a bit but we didn't capitalise.

"But it's a clean sheet and overall I'm delighted.'' The only downside for Pools was the loss of Sam Collins and Richard Barker in the opening stages through injury.

Both could miss most of the six games remaining.

"We had to make a couple of early changes and it's been a fairly testing season for us with injuries,'' said Wilson. "We don't know how bad Sam is yet. He may have broken a couple of ribs and Richie has a hamstring problem. I hope I'm wrong, but we may be missing them a while.

"The important part is that we have players back and and available again now. James Brown isn't fully match fit yet, but you can see how he can contribute.

"We had to make changes, when perhaps we didn't want to.

James could have had a hat-trick and was a bit rusty at times. But remember he hasn't been playing much for the last seven weeks or so.

"We played some nice football and that's how we try and play the game. They scrambled away a few efforts and we caused them problems in areas we felt we could do that.'' He added: "James has played a lot of football in the last week, we didn't want to use him as early as we did. We thought he would get on at some time, but not that early. In an ideal world we would have waited.

"I wanted Richie fresh for today and that's why I didn't use him on Saturday - and when he was on the pitch today he looked like he had enjoyed a break.

"But some of the boys have had a heavy schedule and they are out on their feet now.'' Porter struck a post with a low drive from 18 yards, Andy Monkhouse took the rebound and saw his shot charged down by Terry Skiverton and, when the ball was returned into the area, Barker hooked a volley over.

The strikers then combined on a counter attack, which led to Porter's attempted chip from 20 yards being gathered by Scott Flinders.

Micky Nelson was one of three players dropped from Saturday's loss at Crewe, but it wasn't long before he was back in the fray, replacing Collins on 13 minutes.

Four minutes later Barker's game was over, ended by a hamstring injury on his return from knee ligament trouble, with Brown put up front.

Brown put Pools ahead on 29 minutes, after a bout of comedy defending from the visitors and a some quick thinking from Pools.

Keeper Flinders sliced his clearance under pressure from Porter and full-back Terrell Forbes got into a muddle trying to keep it in play.

Andy Monkhouse took a quick throw and found Porter, who bounced beyond Skiverton and pulled his cross low for Brown to drill in his 12th of the season.

Arran Lee-Barrett made an important stop soon afterwards to keep out a Marcus Stewart header. That was about it as far as Stewart was concerned, the former Sunderland marksman barely involved from wide.

It was a long wait before any more goalmouth action or incident in the game. When it came, Porter made it 2-0.

Following a tidy game of keepball on the left side, Humphreys backheeled for Monkhouse to cross low and the ball rolled for the striker to drill in from ten yards.

Next time Pools linked up in style on the left it was even better on the eye - Porter's deft flick putting Humphreys in, although Brown's goalbound shot was blocked.

* Former Pools goalkeeper Dimi Konstantopoulos is expected to sign for Nottingham Forest on loan today.