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Meeting Charlton Fans... Unexpectedly!

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  • LargeAddick
    LargeAddick Posts: 32,575
    Think I’ve mentioned before but seem to remember years ago that the governor of one of the pubs in Tintagel was a Charlton fan and had various bits up on the walls?!?
    Will he be showing the Millwall game?
  • Gribbo
    Gribbo Posts: 8,490
    Think I’ve mentioned before but seem to remember years ago that the governor of one of the pubs in Tintagel was a Charlton fan and had various bits up on the walls?!?
    Jesus mate, yeah you have mentioned this once or ten times before ffs
  • RalphMilnesgut
    RalphMilnesgut Posts: 1,751
    I was in the British Beer Company bar in Plymouth Massachusetts last year. Only a small place. The landlord heard my accent and asked where I was from in London. I told him Woolwich and he asked who I supported? When I mentioned Charlton he shouted 'Up the Addicks' and bought me a pint.
  • Many moons ago I was on a shop refit in Southport and as full time was nearing, I wandered over to the Radio Rentals shop to join all the other blokes watching the results come through on the BBC teleprinter. As our result came through (a win), I let out a yes, get in shout exactly the same time as another bloke stood the other end of the shop window and much to the amusement, or probably shock of everyone else there.
  • oohaahmortimer
    oohaahmortimer Posts: 34,155
    It wasn’t entirely unexpected, but was also at Lord’s yesterday and spoke to Big William before start of play. 

    Plus ooh aah and I assume his boys were sitting a few rows in front.

    I was tempted to ask them which one is little shit, petrolhead etc, but thought better of it  :D


    Only boffin and Peter Kay were there on Friday 
    little shit there yesterday/today
    petrolhead on school trip to India (said he had a plumb lbw not given out , playing street cricket with local kids , cheating cnuts) 
  • oohaahmortimer
    oohaahmortimer Posts: 34,155
    Think I’ve mentioned before but seem to remember years ago that the governor of one of the pubs in Tintagel was a Charlton fan and had various bits up on the walls?!?
    Do you know which pub , my scum mate got a place down there and we have a golf trip every year and frequent some of the local establishments .
  • usetobunkin
    usetobunkin Posts: 2,185
    On a response driving course in North Wales, a few years ago along side some LAS paramedics doing their motorcycle training. 
    Having fish and chips in the hotel, I asked for Haddock, one of the paramedics chimed in “you don’t support them do you?” 
    “ Sure do!”  He told me that while he was training at Avery Hill Campus he had started following us, and eventually made them his team. 
    A few weeks later I am roadside in Central London, when a LAS bike comes past a toot of the blues and two followed by “ Up the Addicks!!”
  • Scoham
    Scoham Posts: 37,382
    Years ago I took a football with our badge on to school, I think it ended up on a roof.

    I later got it back from the caretaker who was a fan, I believe he said he had a season ticket in the Covered End.

    I live over 60 miles from The Valley, so there’s not loads of Charlton fans around here.
  • redbuttle
    redbuttle Posts: 1,983
    When we moved house in Peterborough to our current house, saw one of our neighbours out in the front garden in a Charlton shirt.
  • Chippycafc
    Chippycafc Posts: 14,150
    Went to Paris 26 years ago, and right at the very top of the Eiffel tower  was a guy wearing a Charlton shift. Turns out he sat 3 or 4 rows in front of me in the East Stand, neither of us ever recall seeing each other before and yes after that we regularly met on the concourse and on the train too and from the game.
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  • Steven81
    Steven81 Posts: 1,003
    Went to Paris 26 years ago, and right at the very top of the Eiffel tower  was a guy wearing a Charlton shift. Turns out he sat 3 or 4 rows in front of me in the East Stand, neither of us ever recall seeing each other before and yes after that we regularly met on the concourse and on the train too and from the game.
    This sounds like a romantic movie 😂 what are the chances.
  • ElfsborgAddick
    ElfsborgAddick Posts: 29,073
    edited July 13
    In '98 I was in Auckland airport having got off a flight from LA.  Wandering out of arrivals to get transport into the city I heard somebody shouting "hey mate, wait a minute".  He'd left his spot at check-in to say he was Charlton and really happy to see a Charlton fan, as he was.  

    I should have given him my top.
  • SuedeAdidas
    SuedeAdidas Posts: 7,743
    Think I’ve mentioned before but seem to remember years ago that the governor of one of the pubs in Tintagel was a Charlton fan and had various bits up on the walls?!?
    Do you know which pub , my scum mate got a place down there and we have a golf trip every year and frequent some of the local establishments .
    This was 20 years or so ago mate. Was the closest one to the walkway down to the castle. 
  • willieduff
    willieduff Posts: 986
    Just wanted to check in with others who might have met other Charlton fans in unexpected situations. 

    Living in Sheffield, the other day I was sat in my neighbours garden. I'd just made a round of brews for me, neighbour and his mate. At which point the visiting mate spots my Charlton mug and says, "Who's the Charlton fan?" I explain it's me, before he drops a bombshell (it is to me) that a mate of his is also a Charlton fan. A brief text message exchange results in said Charlton fan turning up at the garden meetup. 

    As it goes, this lad lives in the same area of Sheffield as me. 

    Unremarkable you might think but his back story is lovely. He was a kid at school in Sheffield 20 years ago, when his mates were all picking teams to support. Not wanting to pick a fanshionable top 4 club, he picked Charlton and his love affair took off. 

    He has since gone to games all over the country.. His knowledge of the high and lows was extensive, as was his views and reviews of games and squads over the years he's been watching. 

    The remarkable aspect for me, is that he doesn't know a single other fan socially and has travelled all by himself.  

    Not that it is relevant, but he is a lad of Pakistani heritage, thus most of his friends are into other sports, hence none show any interest in his Charlton musings. 

    Wondered where anyone else might have struck up a conversation with a fellow Addick, out of the blue, away from the football community. 
    Lovely to hear I’m not the only Charlton fan in Sheffield! Usually when I’m asked who I support it’s greeted with a blank expression and the odd ‘Wasn’t Curbishley your manager?’

    I’ve lived very close to Sheffield for over a decade and work all over the city and have never come across another Charlton fan so fantastic to hear there is at least 3 of us.

    I live close by in Chesterfield, so you can add me to your list.
  • gringo
    gringo Posts: 587
    edited July 13
    Scoham said:
    Years ago I took a football with our badge on to school, I think it ended up on a roof.

    were you showing your schoolmates Nicky Baileys recent penalty kick by chance?
  • Bangkokaddick
    Bangkokaddick Posts: 4,297
    I had a Ukrainian guest out our guesthouse in Phuket. I had a signed Charlton shirt on the wall and he was very excited when he saw it. Turns out he was best friends with our under 18 coach Sergei Baltacha and had been following Charlton since Sergei joined us.

    Also had a couple of Swedish guests for whom Charlton was their English team and a group of Norwegian regular customers who started follwoing Charlton because of me and who were sending regular Whatsapp messages after commadeering the TV in the local pub to watch the play-off final!
  • Kessell7
    Kessell7 Posts: 158
    Was on a 5-day trek though Torres del Paine in Chilean Patagonia last year, and ended up eating a cup of instant noodles alongside a fellow Charlton fan in the campground.

    Pretty sure it wasn't a hypothermia related hallucination but can't be certain.
  • Not particularly obscure but still pleasant encounters:
    Isle of Wight last June, I was sat in a café on Shanklin high street hearing a woman chat to her husband about upcoming fixtures. I clocked it was our games and said hello, turned out the husband had no interest in football let alone Charlton. 
    They explained IOW residents tend to be more of a cricket fanbase so it was a novelty for her to have someone to talk to about football, especially Charlton.
    A day or 2 later I was looking in a retro football shirt shop in Ryde, next door was a vintage clothing shop with a Charlton Athletic dog bowl outside. Again, had to say hello, turned out to be the owner's wife who was the Charlton fan (originally from Erith), the husband was a Brummie. Although I don't think she drank from the dog bowl...
  • Big William
    Big William Posts: 3,842
    Was queuing for the buffet car on the train home from Carlise in 1981 - to no avail, the team got there first - and I started talking to this old couple who were travelling  down from Scotland and had grabbed some seats before the influx of Addicks. Anyway, turned out they'd lived in Maidstone for a while and the fella used to go to The Valley in the days of Billy Bonds. He didn't keep up with our fortunes  after he moved up North, but was chuffed to hear we'd got promoted that day. When the word came back the buffet had been cleaned out he gave me a couple of his lagers, what a nice chap.
  • thewolfboy
    thewolfboy Posts: 2,927
    Seeing Kevin at the Calais passport check out point was a nice surprise. Some time ago mind...
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  • Covered End
    Covered End Posts: 52,013
    edited July 14
    Seeing Kevin at the Calais passport check out point was a nice surprise. Some time ago mind...
    Are we all supposed to know Kevin?
  • king addick
    king addick Posts: 3,702
    Gribbo said:
    Think I’ve mentioned before but seem to remember years ago that the governor of one of the pubs in Tintagel was a Charlton fan and had various bits up on the walls?!?
    Jesus mate, yeah you have mentioned this once or ten times before ffs
    Jesus has a pub in Tintagel and is a Charlton fan...blimey!
  • DOUCHER
    DOUCHER Posts: 7,907
    my dad is in france atm in a small, sleepy 'bastide' town in south west France and they had a band on in the market square saturday night - very few english there but he starts chatting to a bloke on the next table and he's a charlton fan from woolwich 
  • TelMc32
    TelMc32 Posts: 9,056
    Went to Lisbon for my first Republic of Ireland away game back in 1995. Mate and I had sat in the Co-Op Travel Agents in Woolwich for an hour. Having booked the flight straight away, the lady then asked us what was happening as every hotel was booked. We had 30,000 travelling. We just shrugged and said we’d just take the flight.

    On the bus from the airport into Lisbon, there was the two of us and a young lad wearing a Galway United shirt. We got talking and asked him where he was staying. He dug into his backpack, pulled out a global directory of youth hostels and…two Charlton programmes.

    We just looked at each other and said we were both fans. Turns out he was a member of the Charlton Athletic Irish Supporters Club.  We didn’t even know we had one at that stage.

    He got us to the hostel, we got a room and met up with a few others from New York & Oz who were going to the game. We didn’t have match tickets, so they walked us to the Portuguese FA offices nearby and we were sorted for accommodation and tickets within an hour of getting on the bus 😊
  • I've had a few chances encounters in my time that always brighten my day. 

    2005 - Cuenca, Ecuador. I was travelling for the summer, and whilst taking in the market, trying on the finest Panama hats dos dollars could buy, someone in a Matt Holland shirt walked right past me. I stopped him, we had a chat - he was from Bexleyheath.

    2009 - Coles in Neutral Bay, Sydney. I was doing a bit of food shopping when an Aussie spotted me in my shirt and did the old 'i don't see many of us around these parts' and we had a nice little natter for a couple of minutes. He'd been living there for twenty years or so.

    2025 - Tesco, kettering. A week after the playoff final, I was again shopping in a different shirt, and a woman stopped me and said 'I don't often see Charlton fans round here' (a bit of a catchphrase amongst us out of towners!) and we had a good chat about the final and next season. 

    I photograph a lot of comedy, so whenever comedian Tom Toal plays round these parts we always end up talking Charlton. Not as random, but always an absolute joy! 
  • Danepak
    Danepak Posts: 1,630
    I work in sales and had sent a proposal to a school in a rural part of New Zealand. A few weeks later, I received a call from the principal, who said they were interested in discussing it further. He then admitted to having stalked me on Facebook - which was a little unexpected - and noticed that I followed Charlton. It turned out this was also his team while he lived in London, and he still follows them.
  • jonno
    jonno Posts: 117
    Long time ago and my recollection is sketchy but somewhere in Spain I saw a vendor on the beach with a large Charlton flag. The lady was the niece of Charlie Revell. She impressed i knew who Charlie was, but would be less impressed that I've forgotten pretty much everything else!
  • guinnessaddick
    guinnessaddick Posts: 28,645
    Just before the ‘98 playoff final, I went to a family funeral back in Ireland. I took my mum with me. Upon returning, at the airport in Knock, my mum was in the queue to check in and I returned the hire car. When I got to the queue to check in, my mum tells me that the man in front is a Charlton fan. Got talking and he said he was heading over to try to get tickets for the final. He said he had a problem as he hadn’t been over to a game for a good while and the only way to get some at the time, was by used ticket stubs. I told him to hang on for a second, then produce the two semi final ticket stubs I had in my wallet for both the home & away game, I gave them to him. You should have seen his face. I did get them back from him afterwards. His name was George and he was living in Mayo, sadly lost track of him since then.
  • valleynick66
    valleynick66 Posts: 4,891
    Danepak said:
    I work in sales and had sent a proposal to a school in a rural part of New Zealand. A few weeks later, I received a call from the principal, who said they were interested in discussing it further. He then admitted to having stalked me on Facebook - which was a little unexpected - and noticed that I followed Charlton. It turned out this was also his team while he lived in London, and he still follows them.
    Did you get the sale?!

    🙋‍♂️