http://www.cafc.co.uk/news/article/20140529-board-thanks-former-head-coach-jose-riga-1582668.aspxFollowing Tuesday’s appointment of Bob Peeters, Charlton Director Katrien Meire has extended her thanks to former Head Coach José Riga. Riga took the reins following the departure of Chris Powell in March and guided the Addicks to Championship safety with seven wins and three draws from his 16 games in charge. And with the Belgian’s short-term deal having come to an end, Meire insisted that the appointment of Peeters was not an easy decision for the board to make.
“When José arrived he had other commitments and it was not easy for him to make himself available, but he succeeded to find an arrangement and showed great commitment in his work at Charlton. He faced an extremely difficult job in keeping our club in the Championship, having to do so with a number of our young academy players and, for that, he deserves a lot of praise. He helped us out and took on the temporary assignment because of the good relationship that he shares with Charlton’s owner, Roland Duchâtelet, and we were very grateful for him doing so. There were not any discussions at that time about the role beyond the final game of the season, but José grew to love the job and the fans and as a board we were very happy with him just as the fans were. When the assignment was finished he was interested in continuing at Charlton.
He was a very serious candidate to get the job because he was so successful but, in the meantime, we looked at other alternatives. We looked at all aspects and, with a number of strong candidates, we had a difficult decision to make to choose between them, of course, all decisions come with an element of risk, but we balanced all the pros and cons and, finally, we came to a conclusion that we would go forward with Bob Peeters. It was a very difficult choice and it does not mean that we are not extremely grateful for José’s work at Charlton, just as we were grateful for the work of Chris Powell before him. After weighing up all the information an informed decision was made which, we think, will turn out to be the best thing for the club.”Following the recent departures of Ben Hamer and Dorian Dervite, along with a number of other out-of-contract players, the board have acknowledged that the playing squad will need to go through a rebuilding phase over the coming weeks and months. However, while there will likely be a period of transition as the new-look squad takes time to gel, the aim remains to put together as strong a group as possible to be competitive in the Championship.
“The situation when we took over at Charlton was not easy,” said Meire, who joined the club following Duchâtelet’s takeover in January. We have already seen some other departures since the end of the season, but fans should be assured that we are working very hard to recruit new players to create a strong team. Last year was a great achievement that we survived in the manner we did. Next season will be a new one with many new players and a new Head Coach. There will be a lot of unknowns going into the new season but we are very ambitious and will do our best to have the best possible team to take us forward.”
Comments
Or to be more precise, the team sheet goes up and Addicks throughout The Valley say with one voice "Who the hell is that?"
To be fair, that's a very tongue-in-cheek comment. More seriously, I think it's an honest appraisal of how things are likely to be this coming season. I don't think Roland's "master plan" will take the summer break to bear fruition.
This season is going to be a very bumpy ride, methinks. Better buckle up.
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I look forward to seeing this new look squad, as at the moment it's our current one with a huge trim!! Unbelievable how many signings we are going to need.. get to work team Roly poly!
Im really hoping this all works out and RD is done being the puppet master. A few non Belgian or network signings would certainly help appease my anxiety. Fingers crossed we'll be in a far more stable position in a month.
Ive got a feeling my sense of humor will need to be on a par with Big Bob to get through this next 4 weeks.
Is that you RD?
Personally, I just read it as "We considered Jose for the job, but he didn't do as he was told, naughty boy and ultimately, Bob was a cheaper option".................
This statement is a direct response to the people kicking up a fuss about why JR never got the job in my opinion.
If thats the case then she can't be knocked for that and she's actually taking a pro-active attitude to try and give away as much info to the fans as she probably allowed.
Im sure there will be more about BP in due course.
Prefer if she has said we will push to get into the premiership
Hard to work out exactly what this phrase means, but for me a decent squad with decent coaching needs only a couple of hundred hours on the training ground and less than a dozen matches.
Fast forward to November 2014 when maybe KM says:
"The transfer market did not turn out exactly as we expected, seeing as most of the players we were interested in, were also being tracked by other clubs. This meant that we had to draft in players from other clubs in our network and these players have taken time to gel"
When our L1 title winning squad was assembled, many deals were completed in May / early June so that everyone had a decent pre-season. Players that have left us (Hamer/Green/Dervite) have already found clubs and have started "to gel" with their new teams already.
Waiting too long to get players is what left us with Spongefoot and Sodall last season - get a move on Charlton!
Not sure that any chairman would go into more detail than that about why a coach was chosen - unless Murray released a statement a few years back saying 'Yeah, we appointed Dowie to annoy Palace, hahaha' and I missed it.
Honestly, the club are better off saying f*ck all.