Where did it all go wrong?

I know theres reasons but i still cant quite understand how we've ended up in this mess.
We were a good strong mid table prem side with international players like bent, murphy, kiely etc and then in 5 years we're in league 1 with players like francis, mcoxo.
Where did it all go wrong? I realise curbs wanted a break but why did we get dowie?
I realise this is a silly thread but i was just thinking about it and thought i'd get your views.

please log in to view this image

 

In my opinion the blame is spread evenly between Richard Murray and Ian Dowie...

Murray... All he had to do was select the right replacement for Curbs, imo Dowie was never going to be the right man for the job in a million years and so it proved.

Dowie... Hopelessly out of his depth from day one and signed the most amount of s**t I've ever know of any Charlton manager.

Had Murray replaced Curbs with the right man and had that man used the generous transfer budget wisely, there's absolutely no doubt in my mind that we would still be a Premiership club.

Oh well... no point crying over spilt milk. It's the here and now that's important... but that's my take on it for what it's worth.

 

When Parker left.
If he had stayed then we would have got into Europe that season, no doubt about it.

 

Franco, Murray could have appointed Avram Grant then where would we be

 

Just be glad the Richard Murray era is over, because without Curbs he was taking us into oblivion.

 

Franco- It was Richard Murray who appointed Dowie to spite Jordan. Bringing Tony Christie to the Valley so that we could all sing "We sent the Palace down" proves how obsessed he was.

 

If there's any semblance of truth behind that theory it is an absolute disgrace...

However, i can't see it myself. I just think that in Murray's deluded mind he genuinely thought ugly boy was the man. Hence why he backed him so heavily in terms of a transfer kitty.

I honestly don't know a single person who thought that ugly boy was the right man for the job at the time. What was he thinking... Idiot!!

 

I have to wonder why Mr. Murray ignored the fact that Dowie had just been released from his contract by Jordan so that he could be nearer his family in the NE. It was in all the papers, and so at a stroke he replaced one of football's most honest men with one of the other type.

 

I remember being furious and baffled when I heard the announcement on SSN. Ridiculous decision to appoint Dowie, we were pushing for Europe and had a strong squad in place, surely there were better managers interested. Murray sealed our fate that day.

Also agree with the Parker comment Matt, that broke my little heart when he went, had recently got his name and number on my shirt too.

Equally, I think that if Zheng Zhi wasnt injured, we would have stayed in the championship.

But s**t happens, shoulda woulda coulda and all that crap. Let's just hope the Slater/Jimenez era proves more successful.

 

Let us get this straight, Curbs had a year left on his contract but wouldn't sign an extension.So Murray decided that it was an untenable situation so he decided to let Curbs go and get Dowie, of all people in. When getting Sreck in he decided to back him with 11 Million pounds which Dowie wasted. We have not recovered from that situation yet. If Murray had let Curbs see out his contract and had involved him in the selection of a new manager i don't think we would be in the situation we are in today. Murray and Curbs had obviously fallen out as at the EGM last year Murray said that Parky was the best Manager he had worked with. When you think what Curbs made us, that comment is absurd.

 

I think Murray backed Dowie so much in a bid to make sure this move could be justified. He knew he wasn't right and so tried to buy the success for the season.

How did that work out?

 

Not forgetting that he repeated this by trying to buy success with pardew, another failed gamble.

 

Personally I blame Parky

 

Houndal,you ought to see somebody about your Parky fixation!! Who needs Parky when you have got a club legend to guide us to halfway up the third division. 2 wins in twenty games, tut tut. It really doesn't matter how many games he wins because in some people's eyes he can do no wrong.

 

Before I start, remember I was a PP fan.....

The seed was sewn for our downturn before CP took over- remember we hadn't won a league game in 2months before PP got sacked. We somehow managed to maintain our league position due to the rest of the league, quite frankly being poor. Leyton, Rochdale etc then had stunning second half's of the season to propel them into the top half... but as mentioned, this team was starting to fail long before Chris got to it.

 

I hated watching Charlton playing long-ball football, thank goodness our present management team are changeing that.

 

"I hated watching Charlton playing long-ball football"
Yippee another Parky 'ater

 

It started to go wrong when, instead of building a new young team in our first year in the Championship, we started hauling journeymen pros in. There was no continuity. The young talent on the sidelines became disillusioned. And every transfer window was like a revolving door with has-beens coming in and others going out.

It will only get better if we start to trust the talent we have and get the experienced players to play football alongside them.

 

Why does everyone seem to think that we've stopped playing long ball now under Powell? The only difference in our style of play is that we sold both our target men, and now the defenders just hoof it to Benson instead. We're still playing longball/hoofball, we just haven't got a striker capable of holding the ball up.

I've said it before, but for me, the best footballing displays ive seen all season were under Peacock, 4-5-1 with Anyinsah being the lone striker. Due to his height (or lack of it), the temptation for our midfield/defence to hoof the ball forward was reduced, and thus the ball was played along the floor.

 

Totally agree with the Parker comments, that deal alone was the beginning of the end

Murphy throwing a strop and then Smertin being sold to the Russians without being able to replace him which broke up Curbs midfield think that was the final straw for him, I don't think he had the enthusiasm to do it all over yet again though I do think if Murray had kept Curbs on for that final season we would have still struggled it was a tough Premier League that year possibly the toughest ever but we would have stayed up and would have still been there today I have no doubt.

The problem with Murray was Curbs was running the club top to bottom all Murray and the board did was turn up and organise community events and I think Murray wanted to 'enjoy' the Premiership more ie have more of a say in running things hence allowing Curbs to leave early.

I also think the board didn't aim high enough for a new manager, some might say we are a small club or we're at our level but we were a mid-table Premier League London club which was usually pushing for Europe until our usual end of season slumps (heavy home defeats to the likes of Leeds, Birmingham, West Brom etc)

I always felt a manager like Ranieri could have been brought in or Hodgson even the likes of Laudrup. Dowie at the time was the equivalent of Avram Grant or Paul Hart - knowing your onto a loser from Day 1 and what didn't help were the poor signings Dowie made too.

It all stems from poor decision making at the top, just about every single decision made post-Curbs was a bad one with the consequences increasing each time to where we find ourselves now - a squad deprived of any quality contracted players apart from BWP and Jackson yet still contains McCormack.