Leyton Orient head coach Ian Hendon has stressed the importance of taking their form from the FA Cup into League Two this weekend.

The O's thrashed Staines Town 6-1 last week in the FA Cup and the Orient boss is focused on taking this momentum into tomorrow's league game at Hartlepool United.

He said: “I’ve just said exactly the same thing in there. It’s a good win and we’re in the hat but now we move on and we have to try and get that run of games going in the league.

“That’s the most important thing for us. We want to be up in that top three as quickly as we can and we want to stay there this time.”

Orient suffered a huge blow after midfielder Dean Cox was ruled out for at least six months with a serious knee injury.

The O's expect midfielder Jack Payne to be fit after he was taken off as a precaution against Staines. Bradley Pritchard will also be available after serving a one-game ban last weekend.

But the visitors will be without goalkeeper Alex Cisak because he is away on international duty with Australia. It means teenager Charlie Grainger will make only his second league start for the club. 

Orient have an extra day to prepare for the televised match and this will force the club to alter their build-up to account for their unusual match day kick off at 12.15pm tomorrow. 

Hendon said: “The preparation will change. We’re just going to continue the week. We’re in Monday and Tuesday and probably do Wednesday as normal.

“Then we’ll decide as we go later on in the week. We’ll obviously be travelling one day and it’s a long way up there but we’ll deal with that later in the week.”

Hartlepool have lacked consistency this season and are currently 19th in the table after one win from their last seven league games.