An upstream network bridge connection request is received in a network device from first network component for connecting to a second network component. This upstream network bridge connection request is analyzed by the network bridge to determine if a network attack threat is associated with the client device requesting the upstream network bridge connection to the server device preferably by inspecting certain network metrics present in the downstream connection associated with the client device. If no, then a determination is made as to whether a preexisting upstream network bridge connection between the client device and the server device exists in a connection pool database. If yes, then the preexisting upstream network bridge connection is retrieved from the connection pool database and is implemented for creating an upstream network connection between the client and server devices.