HARTLEPOOL United manager Craig Hignett says he wants his side to score four against Newport County AFC this weekend.

Pools are 13th in League Two with five points from their first four games and former Premier League star Hignett sees Saturday’s visit of County to Victoria Park as the ideal opportunity to earn a first home win of the season and boost his team’s goal difference.

The disrespectful comments, made to the Hartlepool Mail, are likely to anger the Exiles who are still smarting from the criticism they received from Luton Town last week.

“I wanted two really positive home results to really kick us on but we haven’t done that so it’s important we get a positive result on Saturday,” said Hignett, who starred for Middlesbrough in the 1990s.

“I want to score four – that will be the message! I’ll tell them not to drift, don’t just go along with the game; actually impose yourself on the game.

“It’s easy to drift, carry on without any thought. The time when we start managing games better is when we’ll look a real good team.

“We’ve changed the club’s mentality, we now go out to win games whereas last season we were a club that went out not to get beat and be hard to play against,” he added.

“But we have to got to get the balance between all-out attack and defending when we haven’t got the ball. At the moment we don’t have that.”