Has the optimism of post-QPR been completely lost? I hope the players have picked themselves up faster than the fans have.
It's not over and I doubt people here really think that or I doubt we'd have 2000+ at Milwall. The cup was a nice distraction and hopefully has earned us a few extra quid. The players should not have been under any illusion that it was more important than staying in the league because it wasn't, it was a chance for a day out at Wembley that's all.
Yesterday hasn't effected our chances of staying in this league unless we have the defeated attitude I have witnessed on here today.
Down already? Well keep your negativity away and give your ticket to someone who believes. Win Wednesday and we'd be 1 point from safety with 3 games in hand.
Yesterday was disappointing, we've all lost out on that great day out at Wembley, that's all. We continue on Wednesday with the key prize all to play for.
Good post, Lurker.
Sums up my thoughts.
Thing is, those of us that travel to away games on a more regular basis than those who made the trip yesterday , will continue to do so...As a result, we go with hope in our hearts & a degree of positivity in our heads...otherwise we may as well not bother. .
Support OUR Club through thick , thin, promotion, relegation, loss of "home" etc ? Of course- that's what "supporter" means- well, to me anyway.
Rose tinted specs ? Maybe.
Give up ? Never !!
It's so easy to throw in the towel ; spend that hard earned on something tangible & guaranteed to make you happier rather than on match tickets & travel.
But just TRY to turn you back on that thing you love, deep down - is it really as easy as that ? Or are you a true Addick ; a TRUE supporter of OUR Club unlike those glory boys & girls who we criticise at other Clubs ( Millwall at Wembley, maybe ?)
I agree with most of SUMMERS statement, it makes a change to read something well thought out and considered rather than the emotional in fighting that has seen to have taken over since the cup defeat.
The point, of the lack of strikers for me is and has been the biggest issue not whether Powell is manager or not.
The previous owners started the problem and the current owner has exacerbated the situation, IMO total stupidity. Rival relegation clubs and their fans have been rubbing hands with relish seeing us sell our best players and players/manager left out of contract. We are now imploding with fans at each others throats. All the hall marks for relegation.
The biggest shame is, our demise if relegated has been self inflicted. This fact will have a price to pay further forward if we do go down.
Lets pray that we do get a positive response and 3 points Wed, then it might not look all doom and gloom.
Before Saturday i had some confidence in terms of staying up - after Sunday i have none.It will be so deflating to the team,supporters and whole infrastructure. i think we're down.
Next 2 games critical. However, biggest problem has been lack of a settled side. Wilson is our most consistent performer and would be great with Solly at right back. AA must play and I'm afraid one of the youngsters needs resting. For me, Sordell and Tudgay up top and Pritchard or Green right side ( I'm not a fan of either ) for balance. I would stick with Jackson wide left. So team...
Hamer Wilson Morrison Wood Wiggins Pritchard/Green Poyet AA Jackson Sordell Tudgay
why do we have some many negative supporters, lets not get carried away. This year something like 44 points could keep us up. 17 points from 16 games.
from 3 games in hand on Yeovil and Barnsley 2 points would still put us above both those. 4 points to go above Millwall (from 4) , 2 wins from 4 games take us above Doncaster and 3 wins above Blackpool.
Also those games in hand are at home which should be an advantage All to play for as long as we pick up points
Next 2 games critical. However, biggest problem has been lack of a settled side. Wilson is our most consistent performer and would be great with Solly at right back. AA must play and I'm afraid one of the youngsters needs resting. For me, Sordell and Tudgay up top and Pritchard or Green right side ( I'm not a fan of either ) for balance. I would stick with Jackson wide left. So team...
Hamer Wilson Morrison Wood Wiggins Pritchard/Green Poyet AA Jackson Sordell Tudgay
Then, fingers crossed !!
Nope, a fresh start is needed here...
Thurm
Nego. Morrison. Dervite. Wiggins
Cousins. Poyet
Ghoochjihadi. AA. Harriott
Tudgay
Jackson to come on in the 60th min not the 70-odd min when the oppo legs are tiring putting him and them on a level playing field! :-0
I don’t think it is over but it will be soon if we can’t bring a couple of players in of the right quality! And we have had long enough to do this and failed miserably to date so you can understand why fans can’t see it happening – on top of selling our best 2 players so far this season!. It is pretty clear to me how Huddersfield need to play on Wednesday – stop us scoring and bide their time until we gift them a goal – Stopping us scoring at the moment is hardly the challenge it should be and we defend ok, but always seem to fall foul of a lapse or a bit of bad luck to set us back – I think part of that is the knowledge the players have is that we can’t come back. Chrissy may tear up his formation but whatever else he comes up with will probably have other flaws! He doesn’t have the players although I still think that can be changed. How hard are we trying to do the business we need – well maybe not hard enough is the answer with so much at stake!
The cup run will have made enough money for us to fund a couple of players so lets do it FFS! No excuses - do it!
I think we probably will go down. Not sure I really mind though, I would rather have another 'running away with the league one title' season than another 'battling relegation against poor opposition' championship season.
I think we probably will go down. Not sure I really mind though, I would rather have another 'running away with the league one title' season than another 'battling relegation against poor opposition' championship season.
I'm not sure it works like that - you have to earn promotion.
This is a crisis of RDs making - I think we were unfortunate in the first half of th eseason and didn't get the points we deserved - we would have been ok - but the team has been made weaker when it was prudent to make it stronger!
we will probably say up but what is so bad about relegation to league one. you win most games, watch different games, have different london derbies, potentially a new younger squad develops. it is not like relegation fro mthe premier league here, that is a different ball game.
I don't think it is just a relegation to league 1 there is more to it than that this time if it happens. Anyone who thinks we will go out and buy a new team to get promoted needs to think again.
sunday game come round every 30 years to get into the semi finals of the fa cup i would rather lose 6 -0 having a go then that rubbish we saw on sunday
Sorry to say it but loans are still the key. If we get two in very soon we have an outside chancel what we have available at present will get relegated.
The time to bring in loans was two weeks ago when we beat Sheffield Wednesday. At that point the should have brought in the best quality right sided player and striker to maximise the chances of winning £1.4m yesterday in prizes and Wembley money. The fact that the club have failed to do that and that Chris Powell fails to play our best formation with a central three in midfield has failure written all over it. Definition of corporate insanity: put the same people and same culture into the same situation week after week and expect a different outcome! So it's time to change the people starting by employing someone tomorrow who can sign players (and not just talk about it) and someone who can advise/challenge Chris Powell on how to get the best out of the resources available. Whether this person is Alan Curbishley or someone we have never heard of there is very little time left to get the wheels back on the track and very little margin for error. Hence I mention Curbs because he could hit the ground running.
sunday game come round every 30 years to get into the semi finals of the fa cup i would rather lose 6 -0 having a go then that rubbish we saw on sunday
Except you wouldn't would you ? You'd be on here moaning that we'd lost 6-0.
Sorry to say it but loans are still the key. If we get two in very soon we have an outside chancel what we have available at present will get relegated.
The time to bring in loans was two weeks ago when we beat Sheffield Wednesday. At that point the should have brought in the best quality right sided player and striker to maximise the chances of winning £1.4m yesterday in prizes and Wembley money. The fact that the club have failed to do that and that Chris Powell fails to play our best formation with a central three in midfield has failure written all over it. Definition of corporate insanity: put the same people and same culture into the same situation week after week and expect a different outcome! So it's time to change the people starting by employing someone tomorrow who can sign players (and not just talk about it) and someone who can advise/challenge Chris Powell on how to get the best out of the resources available. Whether this person is Alan Curbishley or someone we have never heard of there is very little time left to get the wheels back on the track and very little margin for error. Hence I mention Curbs because he could hit the ground running.
Means we have to sack CP. Either that or he walks. You can't bring in someone over Powell at this point.
My money is on CP staying until the seasons end when we are relegated and leaving by mutual consent whatever that means.
At this point in time I have absolutely no idea what happens then. No idea whatsoever.
They already brought in several people over Chris Powell! First Martin Prothero to negotiate player contracts and then Katrien Miere. My point is that all the best signings were made before these two people came on board and that I don't see any loan signings nor any one with a track record of landing any of a really high calibre that we need. As long as Chris Powell picks the team and can give a shopping list then no problem. We have seen with Hamer in goal and no Nego that he is not being told to play Liege players. The only people telling Powell who to play are the fans who like what they see when we play a five man midfield. Predictors like Fink Tank have us on a 42% chance to win on Wednesday and finishing on 47 points - enough to stay up. But this will change if we cannot win games. What I am saying is give Powell the resources and support to do the job. Either CAFC or the overall network needs a director of football to fix short term issues like this as well as directing longer term development. I certainly don't want to see Powell undermined but my bigger preference is that we stay up.
Only forward that could test Maguire isn't here any more. The young player who was developing as a decent back up target man was Smith and he's gone. Now we have a composed young forward who was in form and fit and CP wont play him he might not be up to Championship standard but does he offer soemthing different then Sordell, Church, Reza... Possibly. Karlan Ahearne-Grant would be more of a threat then all of our wide players/forwards.
Prothero and more recently Katrien were business appointments not football appointments though. Neither as far as I am aware have played at any decent level ;0)
Agree CP needs to be resourced but I think the thought of bringing in a godfather figure to offer advice would be at this point catastrophic.
The omens are as bad as the football. Staying up is now something I think is very unlikely although I do agree that it is still possible.
The team on Wednesday will speak volumes. If Jordan Cousins yet again starts on the right side of midfield then I think CP is putting being stubborn over the best interests of CAFC or that he can't see the nose in front of his face. I will be equally bemused if I see Diego filling the space between Morrison and Wood.
Something is very wrong at The Valley and it must change pdq.
The solution might be to get Sordell to play to his potential - he obviously CAN play. Actually i think he could play wide right, he's got pace for sure. OK he may be a risk defensively, but we've got to try something different (surely we're all agreed on that as regards Cousins wide right)
Without three good loan signings and a change of mindset from Powell I can't see us scoring enough goals to win A game let alone five or six. Powell needs to be bold and go for it not play cautious and hope. I'd rather see us lose 4-3 or 3-2 and give it a go than lose 1-0 with a lot of huff and puff but no actual threat. Wilson must play wide right. If that means loaning a RB then so be it BUT why not play Nego? We are losing anyway so why not lose giving it a go. We can't play Cousins and Poyet together in CM as they are both too defensive. Just our luck that our two best youngsters are DM's. With Poyet sitting there we can afford to play AA too. I'd start him as although he can't last ninety minutes he could help get us in front and Cousins can come on to protect a lead. I'd start Harriott and bring JJ on only when AA had departed as we can't play both at the same time. Reza must start as he looks lively and sharp and seems to give a toss. Tudgay was useless Sunday and Sordell is crap so it's Church or chucking in Pete the Pole. But most of all Powell must be positive otherwise we will go down with a whimper as we did under the hopeless Parkinson.
I agree and these two have not secured the players on loan that we as fans know will help complete the Jigsaw. Our club has a fantastic opportunity next season to grow with the new season ticket prices and many players leaving but we have to be in the Championship. People ask about the financial losses of going down and I'm sure someone at the Trust could give an estimate. To me though it will be the decent players wanting out and the thousands of season tickets not renewed which will hole the club below the waterline. But stay up and we can see whether Roland Duchatelet ambition is big enough to have a crack at the Premier league... For that is what I heard from his executive appointment last week.
Yesterday was the type of performance we have seen all too often from this team but I agree that it is unfair to blame any one particular player.
I left yesterday as soon as the 4th official put the board up for the 4 additional minutes. It would have been hypocritical to applaud any player who may have come over to ‘thank’ the travelling support on this occasion, but I also did not want to deride the players for that performance. I actually think they tried their best, but their best is inadequate at the present time.
The game yesterday was the perfect example of why this team will go down, and to me relegation has been the obvious consequence for several months.
We miss Solly desperately, and Wiggins no longer appears to be the player he has been for the previous two seasons.We lack width in general, and Solly’s absence has meant Wilson not playing in his best position which I see as a right sided midfielder.
We have lacked creativity in midfield for the last year or so. Stephens was not the answer. Neither is Jackson playing in the centre of midfield. His legs have gone and this is why he committed the tackle that got him booked yesterday. On another day, he would have seen red and not yellow. His lack of pace lead to the tackle being mistimed.
Poyet and/or Cousins are not the answer and playing them together in the middle of the midfield is also not the answer. They both seem more comfortable playing the holding role rather than an offensive one.
We have had a very weak attack for some considerable time and losing Kermogant has only exacerbated that weakness. Most supporters were hoping that the attack was to be enhanced by a couple of decent signings during the transfer window. Players with experience of the Championship at least.
Sadly, we acquired a young Polish striker who we are told is one for next season and not this one, and a fairly experienced striker from Iran who appears fairly lightweight – and because of this is proving to be not up to the job of playing against the physical and ‘savvy’ defenders that most teams appear to have in the Championship.
Sordell came with a reputation which appears misplaced and whilst Church tries his best, he has a very poor career striker rate, and does not pose any aerial threat. I have read that some see a likeness with Gary Nelson. That is an insult to Nelson who made the very most of what he had. He ran his heart out every game, and scored more frequently than Church. I also remember Nelson as being reasonable in the air.
The squad also lacks depth, and this dearth will only be accentuated over the next couple of months when injuries will take their toll on players having to turn out for three games each week.
So there you have it. I’m sure we will huff and puff over the next eight weeks, but we have to be realistic. We are not good enough, and are certainly one of the three poorest teams in the league.
As a post script, I read on another thread that there was criticism of the support being insufficiently vocal at Bramall Lane. Perhaps some posters would do well to remember that not everyone feels inclined to chant or sing at every available opportunity. That does not mean our support of Charlton is any less fervent as a result. I, for one, now in my 61st year (and 55th year of being a committed Addick) have done my fair share of singing and shouting – mainly in the seventies and eighties when I managed every match played home and away over a five year period. At this point in my life, I prefer a more passive support at matches, whilst my love of all things CAFC remains completely undiminished. I am sure there were plenty more like me at Bramall Lane yesterday.
all spot on good post mate! like the garry nelson bit
This isn't the eighteen-games-without-a-win, hopeless bunch of rabbit-in-the-headlights riff-raff that Phil Parkinson inherited from Alan Pardew.
This isn't the bloated, arrogant squad of the Curbishley-Dowie-Reed-Pardew year, most of whom were looking over their shoulders, not at their relegation rivals, but at their agents, hoping they would protect their flash cars, flasher contracts and multi-millionaire lifestyles.
This isn't even the squad of Lennie Lawrence's battered, bruised, punching-above-their-weight, homeless heroes, who'd seen the club ruined around them, yet carried on to promotion in exile, but couldn't last the pace in the dying embers of the "Football League, Division One".
This is Chris Powell's squad. Maybe not every player available right now would be his hand-picked, first-choice. But it's still his squad. And it's his first team. Maybe not suffused with the international stars in the squad when he played. But still the team he selects, prepares and makes sure they give their all, in every match. He alone determines what is going to happen from now until the end of the season. And it's not going to be lying down and letting the gloom overtake the squad.
In a few years' time, we're going to look back at this season with incredulity. It's been a living nightmare. But the short trip between now and the end of 2013/14 is going to be the making of Chris Powell and of Charlton.
Parkinson's team huffed, puffed and blew it.
Lennie's team gave everything in a losing cause.
And Pardew's failures gave up without a fight.
But Chris Powell's team of '14 have enough going for them. Experienced, determined professionals like Jackson and Hughes; hungry, angry newcomers like the bunch of gun-slingers brought in since the turn of the year; and the rough, yet clearly brilliant diamonds in Poyet, Cousins and Harriott.
It's set up for the big finish now. And I know we're not going down with a big bang. We're staying up with a bigger one.
Mate you have done your time, you support Charlton how you damn well want and no need to apologise to anyone, let alone anyone who posts on CL, which let's face it is one of the biggest collections of misfits with divergent points of view on the web. I think you have summed up the playing side this year very succinctly and may I add have dodged a bullet by not bringing management style, competence and inept ownership of the club into it on this board.
I have you right, we are down.
' which let's face it is one of the biggest collections of misfits with divergent points of view on the web'
I take it you are speaking for yourself there particularly eh Soapy ? I take it you have forgotten to include the millwall forums as well.
What worries me, and I am in no way throwing in the towel, is that , while we continue to flounder a little, other teams around us are starting to get their act together. There is often a team that just doesn't manage to find a winning formula and get left behind as even their fellow strugglers figure a way, by hook or by crook, of gathering points during the run in. I hope it isn't us this season.
However, a week and a bit ago, after wins vs QPR and Sheff W, I think most of us would have thought there was at least a chance that we were among the group of teams getting their act together. Unfortunately for us, we had to try and build our momentum with an away game vs. the best team in the division, if only it could have been vs Blackpool, or someone in poor to middling form we might have been on our best run of form all season.
Now, after successive defeats, albeit one in the cup, and results going very much against us on our hiatus from the league, it feels like all the wind is gone from our sails and we're stuck in the doldrums.
However, half a week can be a long time in football. We have games in hand and an upcoming match vs a beatable Huddersfield team who we have at least a mixed recent record against and who offer the team a quick chance to get back in the game. If it was reasonable to doom monger that the cup run was detrimental to the teams focus on the league then its reasonable to argue that they should be re-focused now and that the disappointment of the cup exit may even spur them on to avoid a double disappointment of relegation.
I don't think many of us feel particularly confident that we will win our games in hand, but we have them and that has bought us some time and breathing space, but the catch up needs to start now. The board must get Powell some reinforcements, both in terms of quality but also numbers, the fixture pile up will be too much for some of our players, both young and veteran. More importantly, imo, we need a shift in focus on the pitch. Our next three games are all winnable, but we need to be brave and attack the games. This is easier said than done because if we are low on confidence and trepidatious about the run-in, how must they feel being right at the centre of it all? Wages or no wages they can't turn off their human emotions. But if Powell can convince himself to loosen the shackels a bit and convince the players to stay brave, keep passing the ball, keep pushing up and forwards, even if the last attack hit a brick wall, or the last pass went astray we might yet turn this around with the team we have.
We're bottom, but we're not cut adrift, form is tremporary and can be changed and has been changed under this manager before. Our next three games look winnable - lets play like we want to win them, like that's our only aim and for gawd's sake, please let turn up vs Millwall and have a bloody good go at em this time.
why do we have some many negative supporters, lets not get carried away. This year something like 44 points could keep us up. 17 points from 16 games.
from 3 games in hand on Yeovil and Barnsley 2 points would still put us above both those. 4 points to go above Millwall (from 4) , 2 wins from 4 games take us above Doncaster and 3 wins above Blackpool.
Also those games in hand are at home which should be an advantage All to play for as long as we pick up points
This isn't the eighteen-games-without-a-win, hopeless bunch of rabbit-in-the-headlights riff-raff that Phil Parkinson inherited from Alan Pardew.
This isn't the bloated, arrogant squad of the Curbishley-Dowie-Reed-Pardew year, most of whom were looking over their shoulders, not at their relegation rivals, but at their agents, hoping they would protect their flash cars, flasher contracts and multi-millionaire lifestyles.
This isn't even the squad of Lennie Lawrence's battered, bruised, punching-above-their-weight, homeless heroes, who'd seen the club ruined around them, yet carried on to promotion in exile, but couldn't last the pace in the dying embers of the "Football League, Division One".
This is Chris Powell's squad. Maybe not every player available right now would be his hand-picked, first-choice. But it's still his squad. And it's his first team. Maybe not suffused with the international stars in the squad when he played. But still the team he selects, prepares and makes sure they give their all, in every match. He alone determines what is going to happen from now until the end of the season. And it's not going to be lying down and letting the gloom overtake the squad.
In a few years' time, we're going to look back at this season with incredulity. It's been a living nightmare. But the short trip between now and the end of 2013/14 is going to be the making of Chris Powell and of Charlton.
Parkinson's team huffed, puffed and blew it.
Lennie's team gave everything in a losing cause.
And Pardew's failures gave up without a fight.
But Chris Powell's team of '14 have enough going for them. Experienced, determined professionals like Jackson and Hughes; hungry, angry newcomers like the bunch of gun-slingers brought in since the turn of the year; and the rough, yet clearly brilliant diamonds in Poyet, Cousins and Harriott.
It's set up for the big finish now. And I know we're not going down with a big bang. We're staying up with a bigger one.
Comments
Sums up my thoughts.
Thing is, those of us that travel to away games on a more regular basis than those who made the trip yesterday , will continue to do so...As a result, we go with hope in our hearts & a degree of positivity in our heads...otherwise we may as well not bother. .
Support OUR Club through thick , thin, promotion, relegation, loss of "home" etc ? Of course- that's what "supporter" means- well, to me anyway.
Rose tinted specs ? Maybe.
Give up ? Never !!
It's so easy to throw in the towel ; spend that hard earned on something tangible & guaranteed to make you happier rather than on match tickets & travel.
But just TRY to turn you back on that thing you love, deep down - is it really as easy as that ? Or are you a true Addick ; a TRUE supporter of OUR Club unlike those glory boys & girls who we criticise at other Clubs ( Millwall at Wembley, maybe ?)
Examine your conscience & let me know.
You know where you'll ALWAYS find me....
The point, of the lack of strikers for me is and has been the biggest issue not whether Powell is manager or not.
The previous owners started the problem and the current owner has exacerbated the situation, IMO total stupidity. Rival relegation clubs and their fans have been rubbing hands with relish seeing us sell our best players and players/manager left out of contract. We are now imploding with fans at each others throats. All the hall marks for relegation.
The biggest shame is, our demise if relegated has been self inflicted. This fact will have a price to pay further forward if we do go down.
Lets pray that we do get a positive response and 3 points Wed, then it might not look all doom and gloom.
i think we're down.
Hamer
Wilson
Morrison
Wood
Wiggins
Pritchard/Green
Poyet
AA
Jackson
Sordell
Tudgay
Then, fingers crossed !!
from 3 games in hand on Yeovil and Barnsley 2 points would still put us above both those. 4 points to go above Millwall (from 4) , 2 wins from 4 games take us above Doncaster and 3 wins above Blackpool.
Also those games in hand are at home which should be an advantage
All to play for as long as we pick up points
Thurm
Nego. Morrison. Dervite. Wiggins
Cousins. Poyet
Ghoochjihadi. AA. Harriott
Tudgay
Jackson to come on in the 60th min not the 70-odd min when the oppo legs are tiring putting him and them on a level playing field! :-0
The cup run will have made enough money for us to fund a couple of players so lets do it FFS! No excuses - do it!
This is a crisis of RDs making - I think we were unfortunate in the first half of th eseason and didn't get the points we deserved - we would have been ok - but the team has been made weaker when it was prudent to make it stronger!
Definition of corporate insanity: put the same people and same culture into the same situation week after week and expect a different outcome!
So it's time to change the people starting by employing someone tomorrow who can sign players (and not just talk about it) and someone who can advise/challenge Chris Powell on how to get the best out of the resources available.
Whether this person is Alan Curbishley or someone we have never heard of there is very little time left to get the wheels back on the track and very little margin for error. Hence I mention Curbs because he could hit the ground running.
Means we have to sack CP. Either that or he walks. You can't bring in someone over Powell at this point.
My money is on CP staying until the seasons end when we are relegated and leaving by mutual consent whatever that means.
At this point in time I have absolutely no idea what happens then. No idea whatsoever.
As long as Chris Powell picks the team and can give a shopping list then no problem. We have seen with Hamer in goal and no Nego that he is not being told to play Liege players.
The only people telling Powell who to play are the fans who like what they see when we play a five man midfield.
Predictors like Fink Tank have us on a 42% chance to win on Wednesday and finishing on 47 points - enough to stay up. But this will change if we cannot win games.
What I am saying is give Powell the resources and support to do the job.
Either CAFC or the overall network needs a director of football to fix short term issues like this as well as directing longer term development. I certainly don't want to see Powell undermined but my bigger preference is that we stay up.
Agree CP needs to be resourced but I think the thought of bringing in a godfather figure to offer advice would be at this point catastrophic.
The omens are as bad as the football. Staying up is now something I think is very unlikely although I do agree that it is still possible.
The team on Wednesday will speak volumes. If Jordan Cousins yet again starts on the right side of midfield then I think CP is putting being stubborn over the best interests of CAFC or that he can't see the nose in front of his face. I will be equally bemused if I see Diego filling the space between Morrison and Wood.
Something is very wrong at The Valley and it must change pdq.
Our club has a fantastic opportunity next season to grow with the new season ticket prices and many players leaving but we have to be in the Championship.
People ask about the financial losses of going down and I'm sure someone at the Trust could give an estimate. To me though it will be the decent players wanting out and the thousands of season tickets not renewed which will hole the club below the waterline.
But stay up and we can see whether Roland Duchatelet ambition is big enough to have a crack at the Premier league... For that is what I heard from his executive appointment last week.
Absolutely, totally, unshakeably sure of it.
This isn't the eighteen-games-without-a-win, hopeless bunch of rabbit-in-the-headlights riff-raff that Phil Parkinson inherited from Alan Pardew.
This isn't the bloated, arrogant squad of the Curbishley-Dowie-Reed-Pardew year, most of whom were looking over their shoulders, not at their relegation rivals, but at their agents, hoping they would protect their flash cars, flasher contracts and multi-millionaire lifestyles.
This isn't even the squad of Lennie Lawrence's battered, bruised, punching-above-their-weight, homeless heroes, who'd seen the club ruined around them, yet carried on to promotion in exile, but couldn't last the pace in the dying embers of the "Football League, Division One".
This is Chris Powell's squad. Maybe not every player available right now would be his hand-picked, first-choice. But it's still his squad. And it's his first team. Maybe not suffused with the international stars in the squad when he played. But still the team he selects, prepares and makes sure they give their all, in every match. He alone determines what is going to happen from now until the end of the season. And it's not going to be lying down and letting the gloom overtake the squad.
In a few years' time, we're going to look back at this season with incredulity. It's been a living nightmare. But the short trip between now and the end of 2013/14 is going to be the making of Chris Powell and of Charlton.
Parkinson's team huffed, puffed and blew it.
Lennie's team gave everything in a losing cause.
And Pardew's failures gave up without a fight.
But Chris Powell's team of '14 have enough going for them. Experienced, determined professionals like Jackson and Hughes; hungry, angry newcomers like the bunch of gun-slingers brought in since the turn of the year; and the rough, yet clearly brilliant diamonds in Poyet, Cousins and Harriott.
It's set up for the big finish now. And I know we're not going down with a big bang. We're staying up with a bigger one.
' which let's face it is one of the biggest collections of misfits with divergent points of view on the web'
I take it you are speaking for yourself there particularly eh Soapy ? I take it you have forgotten to include the millwall forums as well.
However, a week and a bit ago, after wins vs QPR and Sheff W, I think most of us would have thought there was at least a chance that we were among the group of teams getting their act together. Unfortunately for us, we had to try and build our momentum with an away game vs. the best team in the division, if only it could have been vs Blackpool, or someone in poor to middling form we might have been on our best run of form all season.
Now, after successive defeats, albeit one in the cup, and results going very much against us on our hiatus from the league, it feels like all the wind is gone from our sails and we're stuck in the doldrums.
However, half a week can be a long time in football. We have games in hand and an upcoming match vs a beatable Huddersfield team who we have at least a mixed recent record against and who offer the team a quick chance to get back in the game. If it was reasonable to doom monger that the cup run was detrimental to the teams focus on the league then its reasonable to argue that they should be re-focused now and that the disappointment of the cup exit may even spur them on to avoid a double disappointment of relegation.
I don't think many of us feel particularly confident that we will win our games in hand, but we have them and that has bought us some time and breathing space, but the catch up needs to start now. The board must get Powell some reinforcements, both in terms of quality but also numbers, the fixture pile up will be too much for some of our players, both young and veteran. More importantly, imo, we need a shift in focus on the pitch. Our next three games are all winnable, but we need to be brave and attack the games. This is easier said than done because if we are low on confidence and trepidatious about the run-in, how must they feel being right at the centre of it all? Wages or no wages they can't turn off their human emotions. But if Powell can convince himself to loosen the shackels a bit and convince the players to stay brave, keep passing the ball, keep pushing up and forwards, even if the last attack hit a brick wall, or the last pass went astray we might yet turn this around with the team we have.
We're bottom, but we're not cut adrift, form is tremporary and can be changed and has been changed under this manager before. Our next three games look winnable - lets play like we want to win them, like that's our only aim and for gawd's sake, please let turn up vs Millwall and have a bloody good go at em this time.