Neale Cooper's side will look to make amends for opening day defeat

Crewe came unstuck against Oldham Athletic on Tuesday night and Paul Dickov’s side had started the day in the bottom places. Steve Davis, the Crewe Alexandra expects another battling performance from Hartlepool United this weekend and has warned his players not to underestimate Neale Cooper’s side.

Davis says that our emphatic 5-0 win over Hartlepool on the opening day of the season in the League Cup will count for nothing as the Pool look to build on a promising performance against Sheffield United on Tuesday night. They were only beaten by a last minute goal from Paul Gallagher.

Steve told the club’s official web-site: “Hartlepool will be the same as Oldham. They will come here and battle and scrap and work hard for a result. We have to be ready for that and improve on what we did on Tuesday night.

“Hartlepool have good players and we will have to be a lot better than we did on Tuesday night to get a result. It will be a tough game and our previous result against them won’t count for too much.

“I think Neale and his team were a bit surprised by what we are capable of on that day. We were excellent that day and everyone played to their level and we will need that again to get a result, although a repeat of 5-0 would be unlikely.”