BOSS Tom Killick admitted he may have to make “one or two additions” to his Poole Town squad after they had started 2018 with a 3-1 defeat at Truro City, writes Gareth Davies

On an extremely heavy pitch, Poole fell behind after just 90 seconds through Niall Thompson’s speculative strike.

Ben Gerring doubled Truro’s lead after 22 minutes and they made the game safe late on when Connor Riley-Lowe swept home before Ollie Balmer pulled one back for Poole.

Killick told the Daily Echo: “Our aim now, despite some people thinking it might be negative, is to finish outside the bottom three.

“It sounds simple, but we have to keep the two teams below us and hunt one down above. I believe we can do that and all I’m interested in is preserving our National South status.

“Ideally, we could do with one or two additions to strengthen the squad. I am hopeful of getting one player in this week.

“Marvin Brooks we will be back for Chippenham, but we don’t know what will happen with Ollie Harfield as his loan is now up so we could need defensive cover too.”

Poole travelled to Cornwall looking to deliver a much-improved showing from their Boxing Day clash with Truro in which the White Tigers ran out easy 3-0 winners.

They got off to the worst possible start as Thompson opened the scoring with less than two minutes on the clock when his 40-yard effort sailed over Nick Hutchings and into the top corner.

Corby Moore was twice denied by the legs of Truro stopper Tom McHale before Gerring tapped home Cody Cooke’s low centre to increase the hosts’ lead.

Poole should have halved the deficit before the break but McHale somehow kept out Richard Gillespie’s headed effort.

The second half saw Poole dominate for long periods, but they could not find a way back into the game and, after throwing caution to the wind in the last 10 minutes, Tyler Harvey broke clear and played in Riley-Lowe who fired past Hutchings in the Poole goal.

In the dying embers, Poole grabbed a consolation when substitute Balmer saw his shot deflect off Thompson and into the net.

Despite the scoreline, Killick was pleased with the response from his players after their Boxing Day capitulation against Truro in which the Dolphins boss had labelled their second-half showing as “horrendous”.

“You can’t legislate for the first goal," said Killick. "It was a pure fluke and that set us back. We battled back though on a difficult pitch.

“Truro are a very efficient side physically and they bullied us on Boxing Day, but we competed physically on this occasion and no way did they bully us second time round.

“Other than the last 10 minutes when we went gung-ho, we created more chances than them but just didn’t have any luck in either box.”

Dolphins: Hutchings, Lindsay, Harfield, Spetch, Whisken, Pettefer (Leslie-Smith, 80), Dickson (Bedford, 61), Devlin, Bentley, Moore, Gillespie (Balmer, 72). Unused subs: Rees (g/k), Neale.