Hartlepool
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Hartlepool
FOOTBALL CLUB
H
artlepool FC has some exciting plans for the future as they look
to gain promotion to the Northern League. We recently caught up
with their Secretary Chris Murray to find out more.
Involvement
He told us, “My family
have always been involved
with the club and I had
played for them back
when they were
just a pub side in
the early 90’s.
My dad Barry
Murray
was
club secretary
before me and
had been in the
role for around
20 years.
Himself,
my
cousin
Andrew
Nixon, my uncle John
Nixon and local builder
Anthony Thomas were the
ones responsible for pushing the club
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forward. Around five years ago my
dad was finding the work too much
so Andrew asked me to get
involved and I jumped
at the chance. My Dad
still attends every
game to this day.”
The Role
“It is a full
time job so it’s
hard fitting it
around your
actual paid job
but the biggest
challenge,
like
every non-league
club will tell you
is finance, whilst the
Premier league is awash
with money the grassroots game is
struggling and it’s a real challenge every
season just to keep going. I prefer the
atmosphere of local football and its great
meeting like-minded people who travel
all over to watch a game and when the
team does well it’s nice to think you have
contributed in some way.”
Atmosphere
“As the new season approaches we
are quite excited by the way the squad
is shaping up and looking forward to it.
We finished 7th last year, which is by no
means a bad season, but there was a real
feeling we should have done better and
been pushing for the promotion places.
We have a really young side and
struggled for consistency at times, some
of the football we played was superb
but we need to learn to kill games off.
We have kept the squad together from