RICHARD Barker admits it's hard to come to terms with the outcome of Saturday's visit to Leeds United - even more so after being denied what looked to be a first-half equaliser.

After falling a goal behind, Barker's textbook header from a Robbie Elliott free-kick was arrowing its way into the net.

But the ball hit the underside of the bar and, while dropping down and over the line, Leeds keeper Casper Ankergran somehow managed to pull it out of the air and stop of crossing the goalline.

The effort would have deservedly put Pools level, but instead they later fell two goals down and couldn't find a way through a charmed Leeds goal throughout.

"I was really pleased with the header I had in the first half,'' admitted the three-goal striker. "I lost my marker, put the header right across goal, it was heading for the top corner - I don't think I could have done any more.

"But I don't think the goalkeeper could have done a great deal more either. Probably from then on we should have thought it wasn't our day.

"The linesman on the far side was looking at it, but even so I'm not sure he knew if it was in.

"The goalkeeper smothered and he was facing in towards his own goal - it looked like his body was on the line and if that's the case then the ball must have been over.

"I don't know what people's thoughts were, but it was hard for the linesman to tell because of the way the keeper's body was.''

Leeds moved to nil points following the win, but remain bottom of the table after their points deduction, still nine points and 20 places behind Pools.

Next up for Barker is a home game with Swindon on Saturday, one of the clubs promoted with Pools last season. And the striker believes Pools can take heart from this display.

"We've come to a team who have now won five out of five and really played them off the park - but we come away with nothing, so it's really hard to take right now,'' he said.

"We probably had more efforts than Leeds have had to deal with in all their games so far this season, it was that comprehensive.

"We've hit the post and bar, had shots cleared off the line. I don't know if my header in the first-half went over the line, we had so many shots they didn't know a lot about them.

"Maybe we will look back and say we should have done better in front of goal, but on another day they would have gone in.

"I think there was one bit when we had four shots in about 30 seconds, you would expect one of them to go in. But when it's not your day, it's not your day.

"They say things even themselves out, but right now that's not a positive to take.

"In the first-half we had chances, three or four, and a lot more in the second half.

"The second goal they scored was a killer goal coming after half-time, but then we settled down again and took the game to them. I thought we didn't really start well in each half, the first ten minutes of each half was probably our worst spells of the game.''