Your thoughts after 12 games

Covered End

I don't think we're very good, but apart from Birmngham and possibly a couple of others neither is anyone else.
The division looks extremely tight and there's little to choose between at least a dozen teams (probably more).
Where we end up could depend on a whole host of things including injuries and the January transfer window.

Presently I still think we could scrape into the play offs, but could just as easily end up 16th again.

fenaddick

I think if we have a decent January window we'll make the play offs. It's a big risk and a position we shouldn't be in though. Now we have 2 shapes we can play I hope we're a bit more flexible and adaptable depending on opposition weaknesses

shirty5

Same points as of after 12 games from last season but the same from 2018/2019.

Held on last night we would have been 5th but it’s fine margins at present so we need to show some consistency and be ruthless when we have these opportunities 

Still plenty of time to get going but we can’t leave it too long

Henry Irving

Like last season, too many draws, too inconsistent and now the injuries are taking their toll.

A top six finish is still possible but we're not able to string a long run of wins together (one in the last six) and until we do we'll be hovering around 6th to 12th.

We do have good players but few outstanding ones but there are some average ones in there too.  

hermann

shirty5 said:

Same points as of after 12 games from last season but the same from 2018/2019.

Held on last night we would have been 5th but it’s fine margins at present so we need to show some consistency and be ruthless when have these opportunities 

Still plenty of time to get going but we can’t leave it too long

Feel about the same. Could go either way - think we'll end up between 5th and 10th. 

Sillybilly

I’ll caveat this by acknowledging that I am watching on stream rather than in the flesh. I’ll have a better idea after Saturday when hopefully I get to see us in person. That said, I’ve watched every game so far with varying degrees of attention given the dross on show. My impression is that we are better than last season but are dire  to watch. We are primarily set up not to lose games and to sneak a winner if possible. 12 games in we still don’t know our best starting 11 and it wouldn’t be Charlton if we didn’t have some significant injuries kicking in. I am not an NJones fan and I persist in the view that he is a couple of bad press conferences away from being a laughing stock. I hope I am wrong but I think it will eventually end in tears but it could take a while. That said, he is our crackpot so he has my support.   I am finding the team hard to love and, Ramsay, Mitchell and T’other Jones aside, I’m not really developing any sense of fondness. All of that said, it is once again a piss poor league and despite the fact that we have been, for the most part, shit, we are still a point off the playoffs so anything is possible. If we can by luck or judgement happen upon our best 11, stay injury free and get a run of thee or four wins on the bounce, then we could yet find ourselves in business but I’m not holding my breath. But, as I say, I’ll have a better view after Saturday. 

arny23394

My main thought - is Allan Campbell’s Nan still knocking about? I know Luton fans said he would tackle her, I just want him to prove that he could tackle her. I'm not convinced.

Mendonca In Asdas

Its going to be a long season.

Bedsaddick

arny23394 said:

My main thought - is Allan Campbell’s Nan still knocking about? I know Luton fans said he would tackle her, I just want him to prove that he could tackle her. I'm not convinced.

He’d have to catch her first and I doubt that he can do that . 

blackpool72

Same amount of points as we had after 12 games last season so no improvement so far. 
It's possible we can make the play offs as there's little to choose between plenty of clubs bar a couple. 
I still believe letting May go was a huge mistake and I hope it doesn't cost us a play off spot this season. 

RaplhMilne

Couple of dreadful performances, couple of good and a lot of average league 1 fair. The median being the average.  On that basis currently we will still be here next year. I still think we have the players to move above being average, but is Jones going to make that happen. Who knows ?

Still believe losing May will be the biggest factor in our failure to hit top 6. If the deal for Ahadme really was a Million, then Jones needs to quickly show us why he believed he was worth it.

Miles has come back and looks a little out of sorts, his control isnt there and first balls are dubious. Hope this is just him needing game time, rather than a something more permanent. As without him scoring a dozen we are going nowhere. 

Not given up, but am losing faith, a defeat to Wrexham on Saturday, could see the BOOING start.

Garrymanilow

I don't see where the change is going to come from after 12 games. In the first few games we were aggressive and tight at the back, we just lacked quality on the ball. You could chalk that up to the team being full of new players and needing time to gel but since then the quality hasn't come and the high press and committed defending is out. I was honestly happy for us to be miserable bastards who didn't concede and woke up in the last 15 but when you start leaking goals in the first half it becomes a pretty miserable watch and there's not a lot of green shoots at the moment. 

We need the midfield players to wake up and start pressing high and then making the most of the opportunities that present themselves from that. People talk about us needing a creative midfielder but if the players were doing what Jones is clearly asking them to then it's not expert creativity needed to move the ball on when it's won high. You can see why someone like Anderson's attributes and prized more highly than Fraser, but the multiple players we've tried in those advanced roles take such little care of the ball that simple 5/10 yard passes into space off a turnover consistently aren't happening. Karoy made a great interception off their centre back yesterday, just needed to slip it through into the space behind and played it into the defender's legs. You don't need to be Iniesta to pull off a simple pass like that but Anderson, ACampbell and Docherty seem to have had all their ability on the ball drain out of them. Berry is better but lacks the bite needed.

We staked an awful lot on the team being aggressive, fit and hungry to press high up the pitch. When they don't do that they're pedestrian and need a higher level of creativity because they're not creating the simple chances from turnovers. Jones needs to figure out how to get them going at teams every game or I don't see how it can get consistently better. If and when it does though, It can work

Addick Addict

The fact that almost 40% of our goals have come from subs demonstrates both our strength and weakness - our strength because we have game changers from the bench but weakness because we've only scored 8 goals in 12 games from players that started the match and just 4 in the first 75 minutes of those games. That is as much to do with how our team is set up as it is to do with our lack of goal creators. Whether Jones wants to and can change that philosophy with the players available to him is open to debate.  

bolloxbolder

Nathan isn't as good as he thinks he is and going back for players who did it for him hasn't worked, bar Berry.

Losing our best 3 players from last year was careless.

Our first 11 is good on paper,  but injuries will again determine whether we can scrape a play off place.

My view is we aren't good enough over a season so another season of drudgery in this shit division 3 awaits.

sam3110

We ain't going down, but unless our attacking intent gets much better than it currently is, we won't be going up either. We simply cannot rely on wonder goals to pull points out of the bag all season. 

There's a lot of emphasis on May leaving, but honestly I can't see him scoring many in this team either. The real issue is at the start of last season we had exciting players that blew hot and cold, but made chances and scored goals (CBT especially) and ever since Jones came in we don't have anyone with that creative spark that actually follows through. Small and TC show glimpses of it, but they have no end product 

CAFCTrev

The Portsmouth pre-season friendly, the Bolton and the Birmingham league games have been the best performances. Apart from that, it's all been very similar to last season. I expected a lot more from a Nathan Jones regime, it's been very disappointing. I can't see us getting to the playoffs, we look mid-table AF. 

Chris_from_Sidcup

If we had everyone fit and then Chuks to come on for the last 30 minutes every game then i think we'd definitely be in the mix.

As it stands we're struggling with injuries to important players and i don't think we're good enough and we're certainly not consistent enough but then again neither are about 75% of this division. So i think we'll bob around between 6th-10th. Capable of a decent win against a promotion chasing side but equally capable of going to a bottom 4 side and losing.

Davo53

It’s to early into the season to be making negative comments,we’ve still got 34 matches and 102 points to play for.How ever I think we’re being to cautious while playing at home,go with a 433 formation with t Campbell out wide stretching the defence with his pace and crossing balls into the box for leaburn and Godden, to feed off im sure we would be scoring a lot more,then change to a 442 when we’re playing away.I’d take a point away from all day long.

oohaahmortimer

Birmingham are done and dusted and promoted .
The best of the rest in this league are proper guff and we are part of that dirty dozen or so.
With some luck with injuries we could get in the play offs which isn't good enough we have to win them and get out of this groundhog shithouse league where clubs come to die very slowly .

Croydon

Think we've had 3 good performances so far. We've got a good chance of making the playoffs this season but more through poor quality of the league rather than us being particularly good. 

jimmymelrose

My thoughts are that anyone watching who has just been walkabout in the outback for a while would say:

'Ah, that’s Nathan Jones in the stands. I heard that he was going to become Charlton manager. Any news on that?'

NabySarr

One decent run will probably get us in the play offs because it’s so tight. We just need a 10 game run where Leaburn starts and Aneke comes off the bench

SantaClaus

Our recruitment, especially in midfield and attack has been sub par and will cost us this season. People predicting we're going to be in or around the play off places are delusional.

soapboxsam

My thoughts after the dirty Dozen ?

Two excellent performances against Bolton and Birmingham where we negated their strengths but the other 10 games were coin flicks in low standard fairly turgid affairs which were decided by the odd mistake either for or against.

In the poll: where would we finish, I went for 7th to 12th and just can't see much change on that as I can't see an X factor player other than Berry.

Also I said we would lose less matches, draw more and win about the same as last season so enough to get into the top half but hardly being genuine contenders for top 6.

Bizarrely we were 2 minutes away from being 5th and not 11th in the hinterland of added time in South Yorkshire last night.

Bedsaddick

I doubt very much we’ll make the play offs . One goal in the first half all games this season tells you enough about our team . We are awful to watch for the most part and we are now doing what we’ve done for years and are picking up ridiculous long term injuries. If we make top ten I’d be surprised. 

The selling of Alfie ( and I don’t want to hear that he wanted to be near his family bullshit because that’s exactly what it is ) was the most stupid thing we’ve done in years and that’s coming from a club who is perpetually stupid . 

Brownie12

Very underwhelmed so far. Barring a couple of teams it’s a pretty poor league. I don’t feel at all confident with Gillesphey, Mannion, Anderson and A Campbell in the side. Also need a consistent goalscorer. Godden can be that man but needs more chances created for him. 

Play offs at best, but we need to start putting a run of winning games together.

Callumcafc

From this points tally in the past we’ve finished 3rd and 16th. So it’s still too early to tell.

Swisdom

Until the late equaliser we were apparently 5th last night - yet we've been pretty average.

Having said that to play Birmingham, Stockport and Barnsley and have 5 points isn't bad going this month

I still believe 2nd place is up for grabs because I think Wrexham are massively overachieving at the moment - but realistically we should still make the playoffs

Beat Wrexham at the weekend and a few teams will hopefully start to notice us a bit more but the MAJOR concern for me is the loss of Lloyd Jones.

eaststandmike

7th - 12th

thai malaysia addick

I didn’t see the Jones and Getting Back To The Championship as a one year project. We look a bit more solid but injuries have already damaged our chances of sneaking into the playoffs. I think we’re a shade nearer what it takes to go up if we recruit well in the next two transfer windows. However, this means 26/27 before we see Championship football at The Valley and, as we all know, things can go wrong.

MarcusH26

Honestly I've been disappointed. I expected a more attacking and open style of play from NJ and that last season's more pragmatic style which was all about staying up in effect would make way. Birmingham the main bright point but there's been too many silly off colour performances. Still not convinced NJ knows his best 11 and now the injuries are starting to bite too. 

Playoffs would require a decent sized investment in a quality midfielder in January if we are going to persist with 4222. Currently I think 8th-12th is the best I can really expect.