POST-MATCH THREAD: Charlton Athletic v Stevenage: Saturday 8th February 2025 KO 12:30

LoOkOuT

A tricky one for the Addicks at home, with Stevenage enjoying the best of results over the past five head-to-head encounters and the home side a little deflated after conceding two coming into this one having been up two and coasting.

Ashley Maynard-Brewer with probably the highlight of the first half when he charged out into a one-on-one and dived at the attackers feet to knock the ball away. Charlton scored right before halftime when Conor Coventry put through Godden in the six yard box to poke the ball past the keeper and open scoring.

Then, only minutes into the second half, Tyreece Campbell blasted a rocket off the crossbar that fell kindly to Luke Berry who nonchalantly stabbed the ball home on the volley and with his left foot, making an incredibly difficult shot look easy. From that point on, Charlton never looked back.

Three points and a clean sheet send Charlton into the promotion play-off spots, in sixth place!

Charlton 2 Stevenage 0

Over to you.

O-Randy-Hunt

ValleyGary

Once Coventry got the game by the neck we cruised it. Seriously one of the best individual performances I’ve seen at the valley in a long time. He was faultless.

moutuakilla

Looked all at sea with wayward passes for a lot of the first half. Quick bit of coaching from Jones whilst AMB was down receiving treatment seemed to be the turning point. 

Far and away the better team second half and could easily been 4-0 if we'd taken our chances.

Brilliant save by AMB at a crucial time. 

TheHerminator

Someone else said it but 2-0 flattered Stevenage 

Coventry outstanding. Godden superb. Berry linked play well and was involved in most good things today. 

Superb addicks 

ForeverAddickted

HMS Piss the Play-Offs appears to have sunk another Challenger!!

blackpool72

Scrappy 1st half.

2nd half the most I've seen us dominate a side this season. Absolutely superb. 

Oh and how I wish Godden was 5 years younger,  he's absolutely class.

Gribbo

A rare 7+ performance from every player. Do that on a more consistent basis, and reckon this squad is good enough to piss this league

LenGlover

3 points just what the doctor ordered.

Uboat

Literally just checked the quickest route to Wembley from here. 

siblers

Valley11

We look totally transformed. Hard to beat with quality all over the pitch. The difference is so stark it’s almost like a different season. 

Keep it going. Second isn’t out of the question imo. 

Garrymanilow

Wish we'd killed them off after our second goal as we created enough but I'm not complaining. Total calm control. Limiting a team to 0 shots on target is a fantastic achievement and we played that out so professionally. Keep doing that for the rest of the season and things could be very interesting.

Leuth

ValleyGary said:

Once Coventry got the game by the neck we cruised it. Seriously one of the best individual performances I’ve seen at the valley in a long time. He was faultless.

He put one straight through to their keeper near the end, which was notable, because it was the first and only time he did something other than perfectly. Someone still remarked on the 'woeful pass' in the match thread ffs 

CAFCsayer

We are going up. Second half was the most dominant I've seen us in ages

SantaClaus

We were shaky at times in the first half but the fortuitously timed Maynard-Brewer injury stoppage let Nathan Jones reorganise the side and we never looked back. 

sam3110

We had a decent first 15, then got really sloppy. AMB got some cramp, and suddenly we got better as a team again, culminating in a brilliantly worked goal.

Second half we started red hot and that killed it off, Stevenage couldn't niggle and time-waste their way through the game and therefore they fell apart, and if it wasn't for some greedy play and a bit of misfortune, we could have won by 3 or 4

AddicksAddict

Comprehensive victory. 

ForeverAddickted

13-Clean Sheets in the League now... Five less than 2018/19, seven less than 2011/12

fenaddick

Pretty much the perfect performance. Goals from 2 of the front 3 with TC very dangerous. Coventry immense in the middle of the park and Docherty very busy. Defence largely unchallenged, one good bit of goalkeeping AMB and no shots on target conceded. NJ really good tactically, made the necessary tweaks after the AMB "injury" and Stevenage had no reply

LTKapal

Is it worth questioning whether berrys improved performance now down to pressure to perform re competition for his spot?

Macronate

Impressive game management at the end as well.

hermann

Wtf did Nathan say when AMB went down injured around 30 mins? We were quite poor until then but absolutely excellent for the rest of the game. Fair play NJ

Gribbo

.

Uboat

hermann said:

Wtf did Nathan say when AMB went down injured around 30 mins? We were quite poor until then but absolutely excellent for the rest of the game. Fair play NJ

‘Lads, I said DON’T play like a bunch of clueless dickheads’

AddicksAddict

Small gave their 16, Firestone, such a run around he must’ve been very tired by the end. I hear he hasn’t had a very good year.

Bostonaddick

sam3110 said:

We had a decent first 15, then got really sloppy. AMB got some cramp, and suddenly we got better as a team again, culminating in a brilliantly worked goal.

Second half we started red hot and that killed it off, Stevenage couldn't niggle and time-waste their way through the game and therefore they fell apart, and if it wasn't for some greedy play and a bit of misfortune, we could have won by 3 or 4

It would be curious to see if Jones or one of the assistants made some sort of hand symbol right before his “cramp”

fenaddick

Brilliant pic here

https://x.com/RichCawleySLP/status/1888236053632373012

Garrymanilow

hermann said:

Wtf did Nathan say when AMB went down injured around 30 mins? We were quite poor until then but absolutely excellent for the rest of the game. Fair play NJ

Apart from a bollocking I suspect he told us to switch it. We started playing through Small for the first time straight after instead of just being camped on the left hand side and suddenly Stevenage had to spread themselves thinner to cover the additional threat on the other side. It was no surprise TC suddenly started finding himself able to isolate his man when they realised they had to fear Small's pace as well

ForeverAddickted

I thought as a whole it was a very drab match, but fully expected that from Stevenage, as thought the clash with Blackpool last weekend (especially in the second half of that one) was a lot more "exciting"

Stevenage though have worked out how to play that suits them, the fact they score and concede so little must be extremely taxing for their fans - But if it gets them results them fair play to them

The timing of our two goals, probably couldn't have been worse for them though... The first right before HT, and was a bit of a shell shock moment, but Alex Revell was still able to get them quickly down the tunnel to re-group for the second half... Only when that restarted, we scored again within three minutes, which must have just completely killed off their believe, and they clearly went through the motions second half.

Fair play to Nathan Jones for recognising that the early plan didnt work, and getting Maynard-Brewer to go down injured, its not something I like to see... But it was equally brave from Jones to either change things early or just remind his players what was expected from them, as the early knee jerk reaction could have resulted in even worse.

Onwards and Upwards

JamesSeed

Wtf is going on here. Can’t quite believe what I’m seeing.