Wealdstone go on to win 7-0 after being 5-0 up against Hartlepool in just 33 minutes

Wealdstone go on to win 7-0 after being 5-0 up against Hartlepool United in just 33 minutes of the first half on Tuesday night.

Micah Obiero netted a first-half hat-trick with Wealdstone still on a high days after progressing through to the FA Trophy final.

The Stones had however gone into this having lost their last three league games, while their opponents had won their last three.

But Hartlepool had their playoff hopes dented, Dylan Kadji putting the hosts ahead, 7 minutes in, then came Obiero’s hat-trick to make it 4-0 just before the half hour mark.

Anthony Georgiou added a fifth by 33 minutes, a scoreline no one saw coming, and it only got worse for Hartlepool, with Boldewijn (70′) and Olomola (87′) adding to it.

Hartlepool suffer their heaviest defeat since 1994. They sit 9th in the National League table with 60 points from 40 games played, 5 points from the playoff places, Southend, 7th, with a game in hand. Wealdstone meanwhile are 12th with 51 points from 40 games played.

Wealdstone were 5️⃣-0️⃣ up against Hartlepool in just 32 minutes😳‼️

What score will this one finish?! pic.twitter.com/YOKdAhgoH2

— National League on DAZN (@DAZN_NationalLg) March 31, 2026

Hartlepool United manager Nicky Featherstone said, per BBC Radio Tees: “Firstly, we’ve got to apologise to the fans and the football club – they’ve witnessed a really, really poor night tonight.

“It’s one I can’t explain, we’ve been in really good form recently – I didn’t see that coming at all.

“We’ve given them the best opportunity in terms of coming down yesterday (Monday) and we’ve tried to prepare them as best as we can.

“We’ve come up short today by a long, long way by the standards that this group of players have set recently.

“They (Wealdstone) were obviously very good on the night, but that’s on us tonight; it’s on me and it’s on the group of players that went out there tonight.

“We’re going to come under a lot of scrutiny, negative press and reaction from the fans, we’re going to have to double down and stick together as a group; we’re going to get a lot of stick in the next few days, and rightfully so after that performance. We need to stick together at the minute.

“It’s hard to work out, I didn’t see that coming with the form we’ve been in. Before tonight, I think we’d won five out of the last seven; I didn’t see it coming at all, it’s a difficult one for me to get my head around.

“Ultimately, I chose that XI and that team is supposed to represent me, so I’ll take the responsibility for that; it’s important that, as a staff and a group of players, we stick together now because we will come in for a bit of stick over the next few days.”

Wealdstone boss Gary Waddock said: “I didn’t expect that result because we’re coming up against a good side, a good club, and obviously they’re looking at the play-off.

“So on the back of what happened Saturday, the motivation side from our side, you just never know what could happen.

“It was a big day Saturday, it could have been a flat performance tonight, but me and Payne said before the game about mentality and stuff like that, so they came up with the right answers.

“It feels like we’ve come out of the blocks quite quickly in a lot of games in your spell, but maybe not necessarily always got the goals straight away.”

Interviewer: “How pleasing was it that today we got the rewards for the fast start?”

Gary: “Well we did, because we’ve had, as you rightly say, fast starts in games and not had the rewards from it.

“But we went up to Gateshead not so long ago and we stayed overnight and then the day of the game, it was a long day before the game started, and I felt we started a bit lethargic and stuff like that.

“So I used that today with the lads to say, look, they came down yesterday, stayed overnight, so how do they feel? Make sure we come out of the traps really quickly, set the tone, and we did.

“The intensity was really, really good to start with, because you can’t turn it on enough, you have to have it on all the time.

“So we started really, really well and we got the rewards for it.”

Watch the interview below…