Stephens had his best game for ages but has to share MOM with Haynes. What a difference he made. Really deserved his goal and when he went off with cramp BWP suffered badly by comparison. Pritchard is becoming an integral part of out midfield, but our defense..................... oh dearie dearie me. THank goodness the ref didn't add 7 minutes of stoppage time.
On the train back up to London after the match, Cardiff fan there, had a few drinks, Missed the Cardiff goals as late getting in, missed our two in the 1st half as was at the bar, likewise our next two. Saw the Stephens free kick (no way was that a shot, but who cares)left at 5 - 2 to get the train, refused to believe the final score. As he said £25 well spent on a ticket for 1 goal ! . An amazing night, the fans were great, even at 2 nil with another lost cause apparently on the cards. waiting to see the action on Sky sports as cannot believe our defence was so poor, although a very strange make up from my view. 3 excellent points. And a fun evening.
wowza did that game I watch really happen tonight, the way we started and Cardiff scoring in the 4th minute you had to feel it was going ot be a verrrry loonnng night especially as we went 2 down within about 15 minutes, there seemed to be a lack of communication / understanding between goal and defence and then suddenly we turned it around and fora greater part of the game Cardiff fell apart and I thought Charlton looked very good on the break and took the goals well, JJ really delivers as Captain when it matters and great goals followed from Dale, Danny and Rob tonight. I would like to have seen us shut up shop at 5-2 and settle for 3 pts and a recovered goal difference, but in my opinion SCP might have thought there were more goals to be had from the game, or simply attack being the best from of defence, whatever, it was nail biting especially when the dopey ref decided on 6mins of extra time, come on what was he using for a watch???? what a night, filled with opposites Frustrating - Entertaining, Frightening - Exhilerating, Despair - Deep Deep JOY...its what football is all about
Great story about the Cardiff fan, Ted. I have never understood people like that. He can get drunk in Wales anytime he wants. I understand it is a speciality of the area. Thanks, lads, for the three "excellent" points. Thanks, lads, for the "fun evening". But this was just a one-off freak match and nothing has really changed (apart from being a useful three points better off). Sir Rabid Doctor must be more confused than ever about what his best team is. We still need to get a left-back in as soon as possible so we can stop this nonsense of playing Solly at left-back and Morrison at right-back. Jackson earned a stay of execution but he would have to play three matches out of every four like that to convince me he is worth his place. Stephens showed he is not sulking because his move to Villa fell through. Play like that every week and he may earn himself a good move to the Premiership in January. Kerkar showed he is a lot better than some people think. After watching the video of the Boro match carefully I think some of the criticism of him on here was totally unjustified. Haynes has earned a run in BWP's place. Despite his limitations, Pritchard continues to justify his place, at least until we can strengthen the midfield in January. Most encouraging thing for me was the way the crowd continued to back the team even when 0-2 down and facing a humiliation. I assume that when the attendance drops to 15,000 they will be nearly all hardcore Addicks (no tourists). Green must be realising he has no future here. CP will play anyone at RM except him. Wilson, Pritchard, Cook, BWP, Kerkar and now Haynes have all been preferred to him at different times. I wouldn't worry about the collapse at the end. I know exactly what happened. It wasn't that they switched off, or got cocky. It wasn't even tiredness in the normal sense, apart from Kerkar who never lasts more than 80 minutes. It was that they had been playing above themselves powered by adrenaline. And once the adrenaline vanishes you are a like a zombie just going through the motions. Nothing to be learned from that because we won't play another match like that this season. If I was CP (or Malky Mackay) I would tell my team to forget this match, come back to the real world, and prepare to grind out a result next weekend. A 1-0 win would be great, and a 1-1 draw wouldn't be too bad either. But to do that we have to get players playing in their best positions. If we don't get a new LB in, I would not be surprised to see Fox given an outing. I think that is the real reason he was on the bench (to get him used to the atmosphere and pre-match build-up) as, having played a whole tough match on Monday evening there was no prospect of him playing on Tuesday. If he didn't come on at 5-2 for the last eight minutes he was never going to come on.
There were 8 bookings and (at that point) 7 goals and the ref is obligated to add on time for each of those. Plus a (very few) usual stoppages.
Since I've moved to Aus there have been 14 goals in 2 home games, the last 4 home matches I saw had 5 goals in them, typical. Great result to wake up to, up to 19th, would take that come May.
Hamer 7 - Not much to say really, second goal could have been avoided if he didn't get a hand to it but you wouldn't expect the goalie to let the ball pass him so understandable he didn't, became a bit flappy during extra time. Solly 7 - Played out of position again but played well at times gave away possession trying to use his weaker foot but none of them were costly mistakes. Cort 6 - Mistake for the first goal in extra time but didn't stand out to me. Dervite 7 - I really thought he done well today. Up against Helgusson who is a real aerial threat despite his size but Dervite coped very well I thought Morrison 6 - Out of position, poor performance. However we all expected the Cardiff wingers to bully our fullbacks but I didn't see it happen all game really. Pritchard 8 - Completely run himself into the ground and needed to be taken off after 80 minutes but Powell kept him on, which is a reason we might have conceded the goals in extra time. Assist for Haynes goal and rushed Cardiff into playing the ball quickly, best performance I have seen from him. Jackson 9 - Captains display today. 2 - 0 down and comes back with 2 vital goals. First goal taken with weak foot and put it in a place where the defender on the goal line would never had got it. Solid in tackling and tracking back today as well, complete performance. Stephens 9 (MOTM) - Yes his goal was lucky, but his work rate a vision today was top notch. Hurried the Cardiff defence into a mistake which we then scored from. Today he showed his premiership class and I am glad we kept hold of him because our team without him in would lack creativity massively. Kerkar 7 - Great crosses for both Jackson's second goal and Hulses, when he runs at defenders you never know what he's going to do, looks completely out of his depth and no control of the ball but he showed that he can put the ball in dangerous areas compared to Middlesbrough game. Haynes 8 - Pace is what our team was lacking and he showed that, hopefully the reason he went off was cramp and nothing else because we could really do with him in our team. Hulse 7 - Well taken header but other then that very little to comment on. Held up ok and knocked the ball on does what a target man does. BWP 5 - His performance compared with Haynes shows that he should not be in the team, although he may be the best finisher in the club his work rate is not good enough. Powell's only fault was not taking Pritchard off when he was completely shattered and we still had 1 sub to spare at the end of the game.
Have slept on it before posting. What a night. Every emotion. Tremendous entertainment and a much needed three points. However, and its a big however: completely agree with everything Eddie says so won't repeat much of it. My own predominat thoughts at the game and afterwards: 1. Freak game. Two atrocious defences. marvellous entertainment but proves nothing in the overall run of things. 2. First half hour was like attending the slow and lingering death of a loved one in hospital. A lot of things are not right. 3. What a display from the support. Hats of to you/us all lads and lassies. 4. CP's body language before and, especially, afterwards was, to me, that of a dead man walking. I did not expect massive celebratory runs down the tunnel - he has too much class for that under the current circumstances - but I didn't expect what I saw either. He's not happy! 5. Stephens, take a bow son. Proved a number of points tonight. 6. Pritchard - I'm in the school that he is not a good enough footballer for this level despite his attributes, but he put in a shift last night and did brilliantly for the Haynes goal. Hats off 7. Haynes - Great game. Pace and skill. Let's hope he stays fit. 8. Bambi (sorry, Kerkar). Excellent game. Not convinced he knows what he's going to do next but it worked last night. 9. Cardiff top of the league - your having a laugh. Worst team I've seen at the Valley this year (I missed Watford). 10. Danny Green has no future at this club. He clearly has tried it on with CP's Missus. Pritchard who is not a RM anyway was out on his feet for the last 20 minutes. Green would have had a field day and I think we would have scored another two or three goals. Don't give me the "he can't defend" crap. This was a freak of a football match and the circumstances were absolutely right for some Green mayhem. This is a CP blindspot. He has a number of them. 11. At no point until 88 minutes was I actually confident that we would win. I turned to my mate and said "I think we'll be ok" about ten seconds before they scored their third. Smack! I actually came away quite flat which is remarkable under all of the circs. It was a great night, but don't be fooled that it is anything other than papering over some very obvious and deep cracks. I hope CP pulls through this, but I have my doubts.
amazing night last night. not seen anything like that for a while. pros : we started playing it sideways at the back at times. we did this alot last season and its a good way to build slowly and get the defenders comfortable on the ball hulse was doing the kermorgant leap from the touchline, which lead to a few chances team spirit looked good, they looked like they wanted it fans were brilliant, at 2-0 the drummer was still going haynes was brilliant cons : letting in 4 at home is bad. hamer needs to command his box more. maybe him and the defenders need to have a chat about who does what our crossing is poor, always too short or too long our set plays are predictable. our throw ins usually end up back with the oppo within 2 passes. our corners are always aimed at cort no leader on the pitch to pick everyone up after letting one in brilliant to watch though. nearly had a heart attack at the end. i hope the injured players start coming back soon and we'll definitely move up the table
Also now Stephens and Morrison are only 1 booking away from missing the next match. Yesterday a lot of our players seemed to lose discipline yesterday with Hulse fouling when he had no chance of getting the ball, Morrison kicking the ball away and was rightly booked and Solly who did the same but I think was wrongly booked based on time after the whistle had blown.
It wasn't a dirty match. 22 fouls, which is pretty average, very few cynical or violent, and most fouls towards the end caused by tiredness. Our players who got booked had got over-excited. It was the adrenaline thing I mentioned in another post. The positional changes must have made them edgy throughout the match as they couldn't relax and play their normal game.
Don't know where to start - but I just hope the fans continue to shout their support for CP. Everyone really needs to stick together right now, and last night was a show of what happens when we really rally behind CP and the team. Any idea how many of us are traveling on Sunday?
Apart from Green one or two others must be wondering about their future at Charlton. Waggy- last season he and Green were competing for RM, now neither seems wanted even with Wilson out. BWP- seems Championship defenders are too god for him, can't get in the starting line-up, even with our injury problems. Hollands- Even a Central defender is preferred in the holding role
Last night was superb. An absolute belter of a match, and the sort of occasion that every supporter should experience at least once a season. The NU were awesome, even at 2-0. Respect to all you guys who sit (stand) up there. When their second goal went in, my boy said to me, 'We're going to win this, Dad.' I thought he'd gone mad. My MOMs were Stephens, Haynes and Jackson. I usually pan those guys, so I am happy to eat my words - for now! Next up, Bristol. See you there, gents. COYR!
There was a Romanian bloke sitting next to me in UW last night who said he was working in Charlton and thought he'd check the game out. He was rather undemonstrative and his English was somewhat limited (about as good as my Romanian, I'd guess) but he managed "Bad defense" for their first goal and "It happen again" for their second with much head shaking. He started to wake up when JJ hit his pair and by the time Stephens shot went in, he was on his feet cheering and jumping about. When the fifth went in, he was going bonkers. I asked him after the game whether he'd enjoyed himself and he said "I love Charlton, very exciting - I will come again". Thank goodness he didn't come on Saturday...
I'm going, but then again it'd be very lazy of me not to and I'm travelling down with a chap called Craig, one of the two other known Addicks in Tewkesbury. Guessing about 1200 there on Sunday, backless seats or not.
