Contrasting fortunes for Orient and Hartlepool

Slade’s side look to stretch their unbeaten run to eight games

Orient entertain Hartlepool United on Saturday and the contrast between the two sides could not be more different.

The O’s will be looking to stretch their unbeaten run to eight games, while The Pools have taken just three points from their last six encounters.

And while Russell Slade will be sorry to see the end of October, his counterpart at Hartlepool, Mick Wadsworth, will be pleased the month is finally over.

It was a magical four weeks for O’s as they won four and drew two of their league encounters – while Hartlepool lost five out of six.

The two sides also went into October in contrasting form. O’s found themselves rooted at the bottom of the League One table with just three points from 10 games, while Hartlepool were third and still unbeaten!

Orient have climbed to 17th and will be keen to continue their upwardly-mobile move.

O’s boss Russell Slade believes his side have turned the corner and was delighted with the performance at Rochdale.

“We’re starting to score goals now, that’s really pleasing, but what pleased me most was the clean sheet,” he said.

While Jimmy Smith, who made his first start since mid-September as an emergency right-back at Spotland, was delighted to return and help the side to victory.

“We had a bad start to the season, but we’re unbeaten for a few games now, so we need to push on,” he said.

“Everyone played well at Rochdale, from the goalkeeper all the way up to the strikers and we defended well to get that clean sheet.”