I am going to say it!! Yes I am, Nathan Jones......................

ShootersHillGuru said:

My only slight concern with us is that Jones has successfully set us up to be very tight at the back and then see if we can take one or two of the three or four good chances that always come along in a match. It’s a strategy that’s stood us in good stead last season and again in the two this. Do we have enough attacking flair to come back once we’re a goal or two down ? We came from 0 - 2 at home to Lincoln to draw 2 - 2 last April but Championship teams will be much harder and have more about them in defending a lead. I’m not too sure we do. Well no doubt see soon enough. 

oohaahmortimer said:

I was get him out cos we were utter ponage for a bit but he’d earned some time due to the way he stopped the sinking ship when he came in .
That crap at Bristol rovers was beyond pathetic but he’s massively proved me wrong since and has earned a go at getting us back up even if we get relegated at some point but I know I’d be wanting him out by then cos there’s something about him I really dislike .
Callum is so positive it’s almost madness, which means I’m so scared of him not being 100% keen on Kelman ,I’ve not watched him live yet (kelman not Callum) I’m just getting a Ronnie Schwartz /Nathan Ajose vibe from him

ShootersHillGuru said:

My only slight concern with us is that Jones has successfully set us up to be very tight at the back and then see if we can take one or two of the three or four good chances that always come along in a match. It’s a strategy that’s stood us in good stead last season and again in the two this. Do we have enough attacking flair to come back once we’re a goal or two down ? We came from 0 - 2 at home to Lincoln to draw 2 - 2 last April but Championship teams will be much harder and have more about them in defending a lead. I’m not too sure we do. Well no doubt see soon enough. 

MuttleyCAFC said:

How many saves of any note has Kaminski had to make against two Championship sides? I think we are looking at zero!

lancashire lad said:

MuttleyCAFC said:

How many saves of any note has Kaminski had to make against two Championship sides? I think we are looking at zero!

2 in 2, whether they were notable saves I have no idea

lancashire lad said:

MuttleyCAFC said:

How many saves of any note has Kaminski had to make against two Championship sides? I think we are looking at zero!

2 in 2, whether they were notable saves I have no idea

Nicholas said:

CaptainRobbo said:

Nicholas said:

CaptainRobbo said:

Nicholas said:

Out!!!! yes I said it and I don't care. Shit negative football, making 4-6 changes every game tell us he is desperate and has no clue. Dropping decent players who have played well for no reason.  Horrible little manager with no clue whatsoever. How have we come into the season with no attacking midfielders and no wingers.  We have been lucky against Wigan, Orient and Shrewsbury all 3 of those games we were awful but got the points we all got excited and thought we were winning ugly and it will only be a matter of time before we start playing well. Well we can all see that is not going to happen. There is no point having a midfield if we are going to just lump it past them to probably one of the worst strikers ever to wear the clubs colours. To make things worse that same shit striker is playing alongside Campbell who was not good enough last season on the wing and should have been sold, but because he has a half decent pre season we have kept him. 

Justt a guess but don't think the players like Jones, and think he has pissed a lot of them off already with his shit negative football and stupid demands. To drop Mitchell was just crazy. Then to bring Anderson straight into the team after one of the worst performences ever at Cambridge is remarkable. Today he drops Kane who has been one of the if not best players this season for Watson another weird decision. 

I know I am going to get laughed at about who do we bring in and we need to give him time we cant keep doing this, I dont care anymore, every season we get worse and every season we give these shit managers far too long. Yes it begins from the top they are also a pile of shit. But this bloke has all the signs of the wrongun and think we need act now before its too late.

Not calling you out as a lot of us agreed at the time, just think it's amazing the progress made in less than a year.

Of course it's been an amazing turn around, no one can deny that, after the Awful football that was served up in the first half of the season to what we went on to achieve was astonishing and fair play for that. Do I think I was wrong to call him out at the time, no not one bit. We had been watching the same shit with different managers season after season, Jones felt like a long a continuation of them. The season he came in, he did very well to keep us up. It was a real tough watch but the main goal was completed and we stayed up. We then came into the new season full of optimism, I was fully expecting him to implement his ideas with the players he signed only to watch the same mind numbing long ball football we saw the season before. We was getting beat by so many crap teams. I remember moaning on here during the summer transfer window that he didn't sign any wingers or another attacking midfielder in case Berry got injured, to then watch us create nothing in games and play that horrible hoof ball was now unbearable. We then got to that Crawley game I fully expected him to get the boot I assume he did too, but they gave him a chance and he finally changed his ways and played with Wingers in Small and TC and are fortunes changed and we haven't looked back since. Some could say if only he listened to me in the Summer calling him to buy wingers this thread would have never been created

I've supported the club for many many years and go up and down the country no matter how shit we are, its what I do. I have taken my now 10 year old for the last 4-5 years and he is now obsessed like I was at that age and still am, however it's been so tough trying to be enthusiastic and up beat in front of him watching some of the crap we have to put up with for the last 10-15 years. I absolutely loved watching him getting excited on the season concluding and to go up at Wembley was something special and I can't thank Jones and the boys enough for that. He has done a wonderful job and he has made us a real good side and I think we will easily stay up this year and might even Suprise a few and sniff round the plays offs this season and like every manager or player I moan about on here there is nothing I want more is for them to turn it around and shut me up, which Jones did and I'm glad. 

One thing that does annoy me and I know not everyone can attend games for all different kinds of circumstances, but when you don't go anymore and watch every game on TV , I don't care what you say you will never have that feeling of going away to some shitty northern town week after week and every home game spending an absolute fortune for the team to play shocking football and give nothing back, you become mightily pissed off and bitter and you do say stuff on here you may regret it's called emotion and yes you will still have the same emotion as every Charlton fan, but you wont have the 5 hour journey home in middle of winter, you wont be 200 notes down, you will be in your warm house getting on with the rest of your day. So find it very strange why some weirdo's on here keep bumping this thread to try and prove a point it beyond pathetic and need to get a life.

Maybe you should have read what I said then, " not calling you out ". If you are that sensitive about it I'm sure there might be forums about my little pony or hello kitty you could join.
Be warned though, those 8 year olds can be brutal and sometimes a little weird, be safe.

Jeez don't be a knob head, I replied to you because you asked the question, Did you bump the thread again?? No you didn't so it was not aimed at you. You have the cheek to call me sensitive lol

Braziliance said:

CAFCBill said:

I still maintain that we were perfectly justified to be worried about how things were going around the Crawley game, and my opinion at the time was that he should go. It just looked like things were going the same way they went with Appleton.

I think some people in the crowd took it a bit too far, shouting some pretty horrendous abuse at him. Whenever he mentions it, I don't mind it as I think managers and players have every right to give a little back when they receive abuse like that. I found it amusing that after the Watford game, their fans got really upset when Jones came over and celebrated in front of them after they had been calling him everything under the sun for 90 minutes. What an absolute bunch of babies.

I'm really glad he has turned it around. This is my favourite period of being a Charlton fan. I do remember the Premier League years, but I was just a kid back then, so I appreciate it so much more now. After the Crawley game, I wrote on here that it felt like it was the worst period of my Charlton supporting career, which seems such a dumb thing to say now, but at the time we were really bad. It's been such a fantastic turnaround. Jones has done an amazing job, we just had to be patient, I'm glad that the board were. 

Pretty much the same as you. Since I have been aware of what is going on on the pitch, and understood the tactical side of the game, this is the best Charlton have been. I can't remember a thing from when I was a kid/young teenager about the games I went to.

I think it definitely comes down to who was at the games and who wasn't.

I would love to know if anyone went to all of these games and was still 100% confident in Jones: 



Cause there wasn't a single person I spoke with at a few of those games, that was happy with Jones. 3 wins in 12, 25% win rate, a quarter of the season gone and 12 points to show for it from 36. It's all history now, but I would be amazed if there are any Charlton fans who went to all 12 of those and were still confident.

Isn't a sly on anyone who didn't go, I just think from a personal opinion and speaking from experience, I handle Charlton losses far better when I can just turn the TV off and do whatever as opposed to being there. When you witness poor results in person and have the added long journey home, and more expenses shelled out, it makes results far worse for me.

Garrymanilow said:

oohaahmortimer said:

I was get him out cos we were utter ponage for a bit but he’d earned some time due to the way he stopped the sinking ship when he came in .
That crap at Bristol rovers was beyond pathetic but he’s massively proved me wrong since and has earned a go at getting us back up even if we get relegated at some point but I know I’d be wanting him out by then cos there’s something about him I really dislike .
Callum is so positive it’s almost madness, which means I’m so scared of him not being 100% keen on Kelman ,I’ve not watched him live yet (kelman not Callum) I’m just getting a Ronnie Schwartz /Nathan Ajose vibe from him

I think Callum's positivity last season was mostly based on the same sort of thing a lot of people felt but were more quiet about, which is that the materials were in place for things to be better, they just hadn't fallen into place yet. We were a long way from Russell Slade managing a team of Andrew Crofts, Kevin Foley and the corpse of Roger Johnson. Last season I just wasn't having that the players we'd signed were rubbish again, we'd signed some really decent players with good experience, things just hadn't come together yet. 

Jones kept saying we were really close to being a good team and it understandably drove people insane because we'd seen some incredibly bad performances but in the end all it took was one small tweak - putting pace out wide on the right and allowing TC to push further left - and we were suddenly almost unbeatable. I don't think anyone could be faulted for getting frustrated with Jones making those kinds of comments after losing at home to Crawley but it turned out he and Callum were right. Let's hope he's not right about Kelman because I had similar doubts when he emerged as our main target and they're still there

Chrispy51 said:

There was a good episode on the “where’s the money gone” podcast with Charlie Methven talking about Ange Postecoglu when he was fired, and comparing that with how things were going with Nathan Jones, worth a listen. 

He talks in there about how the players were all clearly behind NJ, training was good and it was clear to the SMT that there was progress being made at training to turn things around. Clearly results meant that they were assessing their options with the manager, but observing training sessions meant he was given more time. 

This clearly turned out to be the right choice, but I do wonder how many more Crawley type performances NJ would have been allowed…

Covered End said:

Six-a-bag-of-nuts said:

Garrymanilow said:

oohaahmortimer said:

I was get him out cos we were utter ponage for a bit but he’d earned some time due to the way he stopped the sinking ship when he came in .
That crap at Bristol rovers was beyond pathetic but he’s massively proved me wrong since and has earned a go at getting us back up even if we get relegated at some point but I know I’d be wanting him out by then cos there’s something about him I really dislike .
Callum is so positive it’s almost madness, which means I’m so scared of him not being 100% keen on Kelman ,I’ve not watched him live yet (kelman not Callum) I’m just getting a Ronnie Schwartz /Nathan Ajose vibe from him

I think Callum's positivity last season was mostly based on the same sort of thing a lot of people felt but were more quiet about, which is that the materials were in place for things to be better, they just hadn't fallen into place yet. We were a long way from Russell Slade managing a team of Andrew Crofts, Kevin Foley and the corpse of Roger Johnson. Last season I just wasn't having that the players we'd signed were rubbish again, we'd signed some really decent players with good experience, things just hadn't come together yet. 

Jones kept saying we were really close to being a good team and it understandably drove people insane because we'd seen some incredibly bad performances but in the end all it took was one small tweak - putting pace out wide on the right and allowing TC to push further left - and we were suddenly almost unbeatable. I don't think anyone could be faulted for getting frustrated with Jones making those kinds of comments after losing at home to Crawley but it turned out he and Callum were right. Let's hope he's not right about Kelman because I had similar doubts when he emerged as our main target and they're still there

"One small tweak".
Well, superficially yes it was, a tweak so simple one wonders why it took him 4 months to come up with it.
With hindsight perhaps it is easy to conclude that things were incrementally improving and that tweak was the final piece of the jigsaw.
What we were witnessing on the pitch was 4 months of stubbornly persisting with Plan A to the point where it turned around and smacked him in the mouth.
I do think injuries to key players were a factor but they did not affect the attacking plan, whatever the fcuk that actually was.
In this instance I think small tweak actually equates to complete volte face.
Such that our attacking lynchpin and, so we are told, our most expensive signing of the window was summarily consigned to the dustbin.
For the record, I was not calling for NJ to be sacked.
He had clearly come in and sorted us defensively and one had hoped that we would build on that.
I think those of us that go to games week in and week out were by December having our patience tested to the very limit.
Anybody who retained any optimism at that point was  operating from desperate blind faith at best.

Exactly, no way were we successful after a tweak, talk about rewriting history.
We let CBT go and last summer recruited no wingers.
Our remaining winger Tyreece we played further inside.

Many fans on CL including me were crying out for some width a long time before Nathan Jones finally realised his plan would never work and started to put Tyreece wider and brought Small in on the right after trying a number of prior combinations.

Jones got it right eventually and I credit him for that and since then he has worked wonders, but it was a complete change of tactics/volte face as said above.

soapboxsam said:

There was definitely "a road to Damascus" moment last season for Nathan Jones when he realised what many of us stated: Use the width of the pitch as we were making it impossible for any cafc attacking players to have any space to operate in. Sometimes it made sense if it was Birmingham at home but to shackle your own side when your playing Crawley etc at home was depressing.

Can anyone who goes home and away remember which game, Small(on the right !) and Edwards became wing backs and we had the Ramsay, Jones and born again Gillesphey as 3 CB's ? TC going out left to receive the ball and suddenly we went from a lame duck to a white swan.

Playing 3 central strikers in a 3 up front was the nadir with Ahadme, Godden and Leaburn tried not once but twice with whoever went wide looking lost.

Seeing Edwards 'fouled' in the box against Watford as the most advanced player shows how much the team has manifested in a more coherent unit with out losing any defensive stability.

Nathan did say it was a learning process and the first 20 odd games were testament to that in 24/25.