If Charlton do not achieve promotion this season, it won’t be down to a lack of effort from Karl Robinson – or enthusiasm.
While the diggers have turned the Addicks’ training ground into a building site, the Addicks manager believes he has now put the foundations in place for a successful 2017-18 campaign.
The area of the Sparrows Lane complex inhabited by the players has new additions. A whiteboard breaks down 21 physical and technical stats with each member of the squad able to see instantly who is top of the pile.
That ranges from body fat percentage, maximum velocity and most forward passes to the distance covered on a four-minute run and squat jump height.
Freshly-painted red and white walls – along with Charlton badges – gives further identity. Signs everywhere make clear that phone-calls are not allowed.
Robinson is using every tool possible to be ready for the new campaign. Academy coach David Powderley was put through a course to be a registered drone operator – adding a fresh innovation to training.
Video analyst Brett Shaw plays clips on his latop as the Charlton manager praises the shape of his team as they work on off-the-ball structure, also pointing out a defender switching off.
It feels like the Addicks are ready for the nine months of attrition that League One serves up, starting with a tricky opener against Bristol Rovers on Saturday.
Thirteen was not the magic number last time around. That was not only Charlton’s position in the final standings, but also how many points they trailed sixth-placed Millwall, who went on to win the League One play-offs.
Robinson said: “For us to finish where we finished last year we’ll have to work harder – so how much harder will it be for us to finish where we want to be? It’s about digging deeper than we have ever done before. It’s worth it. Success is worth every ounce of pain your body goes through.
“I want to thank people for letting me get on with the job. The board and Richard [Murray] just said ‘live and die by what you do’.
“It has been very productive. I’ve never been a manager to waste anybody’s money. A person once said to me ‘spend every penny because if you don’t the next person will spend it for you’. I don’t believe in that. An awful lot of people have done that and left a club in a real mess. I believe in sustainability.
“We’ve spent very minimal, when you consider what was spent this time last year. It’s not even been a fifth of what we did in transfer fees. It shows there is an economic way to play the way we want to play.
“I’m not someone who comes to a football club and just bangs things long, only changes one or two things. There was an awful lot more to do.
“There was a mentality thing we had to stop. There was a mood of ‘it will be alright – we’ve got good enough players’. No, the good enough players were out and the work ethic was going to keep falling. People like Ricky Holmes, who we re-signed on a new contract, epitomise what we want here.
“Everyone talks about Tariqe Fosu’s flicks and entertaining, but I notice him tracking back 60-70 yards and making a tackle when Chris Solly is out of position. Josh Magennis making a challenge in the 75th-minute in the right-back position. They are some of the things I get excited about – that they are all willing to go the extra mile for the person next to them.
“This could be the group that turns the fortunes of this club around for years to come. You don’t know. I want this to be a time in their lives when they retire and look back on it as really poignant moments. That they put everything they possibly could in.”
There is undoubtedly a change in strategy from the Charlton hierarchy.
Robinson is the second successive English managerial appointment and continuing to focus on domestic players as incoming transfers.
But success will be expected by owner Roland Duchatelet. Russell Slade was jettisoned by November when the South London club failed to keep up with the pacesetters.
“If you are not under pressure then the management of you is not right – your drive to succeed is not high enough,” said Robinson. “It’s just part of professional football.
“If you go two or three games without winning it’s going to be hard, because we should be winning. But I’ve been through a period of not winning in five or six matches and being promoted.
“It’s about having a team that is going to cope with the demands of the season, not just cope with the demands in September or March.
“My job is to be the shield. Maybe put it [the pressure] all onto me.”
There is greater balance to the Charlton squad than the mess that Slade inherited after a chaotic and carnage-laden relegation from the Championship.
“We’ve lost players in the past but been able to recruit very well – not always immediately,” explains Robinson. “Tariqe is similar to having Ade [Lookman] back. We’ve missed that spark and youthful enthusiasm in the final third.
“Ricky plays like an 18-year-old – but that’s all we ever had last season. Nathan Byrne was a right-winger who we had to play at right-back. We had no number 10. Now we have got Billy Clarke – he just loves assisting for people. He needs to get more goals.
“Jay Dasilva very quickly became a fans’ favourite.
“He is the most low-maintenance player ever. I don’t know he’s in the building, I don’t know he’s left, I don’t even know sometimes he has trained – he’s a credit to himself, his family and Chelsea. He is a diamond. I’m trying to bring in good people.”
So what of the recruitment? It certainly was a fault line for the two seasons before Charlton lost Championship status.
“The quality of the players who have come in have been eights and nines,” said Robinson. “I don’t think anyone is ever a 10 at this level.
“A lot of people will be disappointed we didn’t go and smash it out the park really early, but there has been a plan.
“Steve Gallen [head of recruitment] is good at calming me down. We finished a meeting in our hotel on Monday night at 1.15am. I wrote down all the players we had missed out on and the answer right back was ‘we’ve got better’.
“We are strong in the back four. In midfield we have Ahmed Kashi, Crofty [Andrew Crofts] and Jake Forster-Caskey. We didn’t miss out on any wide players.”
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One that supporters clamoured for was Peterborough’s Marcus Maddison. At time of writing, the 23-year-old attacking midfielder was still at London Road.
Robinson said: “I can’t tell you the truth publicly on that. We were never in for him. There’s a reason for that. It’s not just what you see on the pitch sometimes in football.
“It’s got to fit this group. If I’m honest, I’d like a bit more height in the team in certain games. But, as someone pointed out to me, if you want them to have the technical components as well then Jose Mourinho would be signing them.
“You can’t have that big, powerful one that is technically gifted. It is one or the other – that’s why people play in League One. There are always elements that don’t fit in.
“We do need one or two physical ones in there. But in the system we play we can also play Josh Magennis and Lee as a nine and 10. That gives us more physicality. There are an awful lot of things we can do to strengthen us up for physical games.
“It’s been a very steady window. We’ve done the business we want to do, and there is still business to be done.
“We’ve cleaned one or two things up. Tex [George Teixeira] was man of the match for STVV the other day – I’m made-up for him. They said to me he is in the best physical condition he has been in.
“That is a pat on the back for the staff here. Cristian [Ceballos, who joined STVV] is in his best shape as well. That means we as a group are in the best shape, because Tex was probably at the bottom of the running – but still fitter than before.”
Charlton are once again near the top of the betting odds for achieving promotion.
Blackburn, Portsmouth, Wigan, Bradford and Milton Keynes are the clubs who are shorter-priced.
Who does Robinson expect to challenge?
“If I name seven then you’ll name others I’ve not named,” he replies. “The obvious ones are there for all to see. Scunthorpe and Fleetwood, their recruitment has been very good this summer.
“Oxford have got in players with real quality, like Jack Payne.
“Even Milton Keynes have signed really well – [Ethan] Ebanks-Landell, Ryan Seager and Gboly Ariyibi.
“There are so many who aren’t obvious.
“People think about Blackburn, Portsmouth, Rotherham and Wigan. But there are several others who have recruited astutely. Northampton have new foreign owners who have financial clout.
“It’s going to be as open a league season as you can see. We have to be ready.
https://www.londonnewsonline.co.uk/28042/big-interview-charlton-boss-karl-robinson-rates-summer-deals-tells-us-addicks-better-place-2017-18-campaign/
You have had the players in and out that you wanted, and a pre-season that you designed.
The blank sheet of paper starts here - and only you can write on it.
Come On You Reds !
I have previously stated there will be two scenarios that will make me renew, either he sells and the Rat and Liar bugger off or he changes his strategy, wants us to do well, does not sell key players and let's the manager manage the team, none seem likely at this juncture.
Win games and get promotion. Then look forward to the Championship.
Don't go up then expect the sack from the owner, if god forbid he's still here next May.
This article is Pitch PR (or their man on secondment within our once great club) trying to justify their fee.