Just back home from Halifax. Thanks for the offer cafc4ever, but I was on my way to the match by then. Spent the night in Leeds. There are worse places to spend a Saturday night. Thought Halifax played some very good stuff, and wish them the very best in the remainder of the season. No way did they deserve to lose that by 4 goals. I think the Hayes/Euell combination doesn't work, and I'm pretty sure it's been done and failed before. Neither of them have the pace to unlock the defence, and both drop too deep. Tweaks said Huddersfield were very bad yesterday. To be honest, I don't think they'll be quaking in their boots about our performance today. Jackson was my MOTM. Solly had some great tackles towards the end when Halifax brought on that winger, but thought Jackson had class throughout. Evina had a great first half, but didn't look great in the second. Pritchard and Smith looked good in their brief run-outs All in all, good result.
Sadly I only watched it on the TV but I'll chuck in my thoughts: Sullivan 6.5 - Balanced between making a few bad aerial decisions, and making some great saves. Solly 7 - Wasn't one of his best games, but that single-handed immense piece of defending in the second half deserves recognition. Taylor 6 - Good attacking heading, scared me a fair bit whilst defending. Morrison 6 - Again, good attacking heading, but was anonymous defending at times. Evina 6.5 - Some good attacking runs and decent in the tackle and cross. Wagstaff 6 - fairly anonymous and didn't get much chance to use his pace. Hughes 6.5 - Great last gasp tackle in the first few minutes, anonymous for the rest of the game. Hollands 6.5 - Some good tackles, but similarly, a bit anonymous. J.J 6.5 - Another fairly anonymous player, but a well taken goal and captained the team to a 4-0 win so can't complain. Hayes 5.5 - The .5 is added for the assist, but has to be the worst performance I've seen from him. Euell 5 - Another poor performer, as much as I love him, his legs are gone too much to play CF. Pritchard - hard to judge due to little game time, but well taken goal. Smith - again, too little time to judge, but with the touches he did take, I was impressed. BWP - not sure he even got a touch on the ball? Charlton Fans 9 - from what I could tell, non-stop singing from before the match even started.* ITV Commentators 1 - Had about 5 facts about each team which they constantly repeated, not to mention the habit of criticising everything Charlton do and praising everything Halifax do, simply due to their respective league standings. *Am I correct in saying I heard a tabooed chant about a certain ex Charlton player?
Yes. That group of fans were, in general, great, from before the game, right through to the end. But that song, the Halifax family (didn't take off cos it doesn't fit) and a pointless Cheerio/You're **** and you know you are thing at the end of the match annoyed me, as always.
Wouldn't wish to name him or the song, as silly as it sounds I'm worried about the club getting in trouble over it. A young striker from our Premier League days, never quite fulfilled his potential and is now playing with a smaller London team.
I think there's only one tabooed chant about an ex-player. Gets an airing at a few away games, unfortunately. Chips before the game were alright, not as good as Hartlepool. The streaker was terrible. Room for improvement, Halifax. Must say again I was impressed by the Shaymen
Ah well, was our teenage followers who were doing most of that singing so can be ignored for the most part...
Plenty among that group are more than old enough to know better, but still, just the one airing today. There's also good reason to think that they might not actually realise what they were singing. Still, most of the noise came from that group, and most of it was good, chants about players and VFR and Leicester, so good overall. The song WWOCB was talking about was followed up with a song about an ex-Nigel, but I haven't heard that before so I don't know the words.
Also, forget to mention yesterday, special mention to the twit of a commentator who said: "what a great response from a player being substituted, on the biggest day of his life." Unless he never marries, never has children, remains a virgin and doesn't make a single friend, I doubt on his death bed he'll look back at a First Round FA Cup match and see it as the biggest day of his life.
I thought the commentators were quite fair with us, plenty of positive things about our start to the season, it was Halifax's day in the limelight, and they deserved praise for the way they played, they weren't the physical Stevenage type team that many would have feared.
I agree, taunting a part time club, recovering from bankruptcy and a plunge down the leagues with 'you're **** and you know you are' was pathetic.
yeah killer...i heard that and was ashamed. no need. why cant we just revel in our excellent performance?
Totally agree with all the posts about the 'you're **** and you know you are!' Its practically the same as Charlton fans being taunted by Man Utd fans saying 'Charlton are ****, they're in League One..hahaha!' Any supporters of a club like Halifax should be praised in a sense, considering their relative proximity to a lot of fairly big league clubs who they could easily have opted to support (i.e Huddersfield, Bradford and from further afield, Leeds, Barnsley, Rochdale, Bury, Oldham etc).
I think it's always more effective to make a virtue of your own side's strengths rather than your opposition's perceived weaknesses. Some people have very short memories - it wasn't so long ago that we were in the financial mire and hours away from bankruptcy. Coming to think of it, the position wasn't so bright before the current administration took over either.
The only chant I heard about a player was "CLINTON MORRISON, YOU'LL ALWAYS BE SCUM!" I was in the pub at the time and I turned to my mate, saying "Did they just sing that?" Was surprised by the noise that the away fans made, considering there was only about 400 of them.
I heard that too But the song to which I referred to has far more sinister undertones. I too was suprised by the noise, and quite proud of the fans too, couldn't help but smile at the sound of 'Valley Floyd Road', 'He's better than Shaun' etc being heard on National TV.
I loved hearing the Johnnie Jackson one, guess thats the first time the Heartbeat theme songs been on ITV in a while!