I woke up very frustrated. I'm definitely not in the Bowyer out camp, not even close, but we've gone to a team who haven't won since December, hadn't scored at home in 2020 and have recently been knobbed off by Hull, Wigan, Luton, Stoke and Reading. They've been handing out three points to all our nearest rivals and we've turned up with three at the back, including a player who had a total mare just the game before, and sat back despite Weds looking terrified from the first minute. You could actually see their confidence grow in the first half once they realised we were more pathetic than them on the night. Second half they came out knowing they could win and we may as well have not come out. Despite that Bowyer didn't change anything, let it happen and even when he made changes they were bizarre or too late. And then he has the gall to say we were 'robbed' of a point when we were lucky to even be in the game at that point, and shouldn't be bemoaning losing a point against a team who were more than willing to hand over three from the start. We've been joking about the WLWLW record but we really, really need to beat Huddersfield now to stop this from being a real, possibly season-turning disaster.
Have slept on it ...frankly we deserved to lose despite the last minute disappointment
A lot of players went missing last night
Davis oztumer and bonne
Doughty had a stinker but to his credit he didn't hide
and the manager made some poor choices...for instance good choice to move doughty up into midfield but poor choice not to sub oshilaja for purrington
I would have made substitutions earlier anyway
Realistically this was always going to be a tough season ...provided we can stay up the new owners have a lot of rebuilding to do in the close season...
That's when Mr Southall and his chums will be judged
Very disappointing result. I was really depressed last night. It is not so much the result but the way we are playing and the lack of any attacking threat, especially away from home. Just checked the stats from Wigan and Barnsley. Wigan had 17 shots, 10 on target. Barnsley had 22 shots, 6 on target. We had 6 and 1 on target! I know stats don't tell the whole story but this just goes to show that if you press and go for the win you are more likely to get it.
Never been confident that we can stay up this season and the way we are playing it looks like we won't.
One of the most disappointing things for me is that last season we had the best midfield in the league by a long, long way.
Okay we have stepped up a division, but the midfield we have available to us now just isn’t of the same quality.
With Cullen and Williams fit and playing we are half way there, but we are missing two big pieces of the jigsaw. Gallagher was one of them, but that’s gone.
That’s why we don’t get players in support of the attackers, that’s why we play the ball to the opposition so often, that’s why we are unable to protect the defence as well as we should.
We seem to lose the midfield battle most of the time, and for our management team to be former midfielders, it is what disappoints me more.
How many miracles can the management team achieve though against all of the odds resources wise.
All the best kids sold by RD; Aribo foolishly allowed to run his contract down, getting in Beilik was a wonderful decision.
Then in the summer after promotion our budget is cut. We are scrabbling for players. Shopping in Tooting market at closing time because Lidl and ASDA are too expensive.
Through some kind of miracle they bring in Gallagher who is amazing, manage to pull in favours for Leko, Field and Kayal. Then Jan comes and they are all taken away for one reason or another.
MS comes riding in with his super duper deal phone where he has just downloaded the Trash Nothing app and Freecycle website as Tooting is too expensive but finds we are beaten to the freebies so heads off to Hewitts Farms past it's sell by date, bargain bucket, take what you want for free aisle.
Not Bowyer or JJ's fault.
I hear all that but in the end its 11 v 11 out on the pitch, and how you set your stall out (taking your market analogy) is of utmost importance if your wares are not quite so good.
There was a comment I saw on here which said we had a free kick in their half in the 93rd minute, which we sent back to Phillips. 30 seconds later, they scored. i mean what the actual f&""k? From that position, why not lob it into the box, and maybe pick up a deflected winner, or a corner which sees the seconds ticking away where our keeper is a long way from the action? Sending it back to our keeper invites them onto us. I was gutted for the team after the Hull draw, and their were a couple of other sucker punches this season, but last night we brought that squarely on ourselves by not attacking.
There is little point in playing two strikers if the rest of the team are so far back they are out of contact. Last nigt, we were up against an out of sorts team who hadn't scored a goal at home this year. I followed this on here, and it sounded like one way traffic. We changed nothing at half time and the second half started worse. Had we nicked a point, it would have been pure luck - our game management entirely depended on the Massive's inability to score from all their chances, so while I was so gutted I couldn't even post coherently last night, this morning it's just anger. All the teams around us won - some against better opposition. We needed a win, but we sat back and cowered.
Huddersfield needs a better mentality, or this will repeat on saturday.
At Stoke we were completely overrun in the first half, but somehow came in at 1-1 after an equaliser just before half time. It was obvious that unless major changes were made to the personnel/formation that we would lose as Stoke were completely in control, and we did, with Bowyer making no subs until we were 3-1 down by which time the game was gone.
I do sometime worry that away from home Bowyer either doesn't see things, or isn't able to do anything about it. We've earned 4 points out of the last 24 available, it's not working.
I wouldn't say it was negative tactics. We played with Oztumer, two forwards throughout and Doughty at wing-back.
It's just that we played badly. Our forward passing was poor and we often looked for sideways or backwards passes from midfield. Bonne couldn't hold the ball up and if we were settling for a draw late on, then Hemed should've come on because at least he was another big man to mark their big men.
Oshilaja did a good job defensively but it was plain to see that he had no out ball because he's right-footed. We miss Sarr badly because he's easily the most penetrative passer we have.
Did we play well last night...... no. did we deserve a point yes we did. most of Wednesdays shots were off target and you could also see their lack of confidence. if Lyle Taylor’s shot that hit the Bar or his amazing blocked strike had gone in then game probably over.
what was annoying was the amount of balls we gave away and our poor passing. we are missing Pratley in midfield.
i have to agree with Bowyer I did not think it was a free kick to Sheffield after 4 added on minutes were up.
Finally, i respect all Charlton fans but I think some are being a little unfair or negative towards Lee Bowyer to be honest who is a good manager and should still keep us up 👍👍
Looked like a carbon copy of Forest away to me. One we nicked the points, one we lost them. Move on.
It wasn't. We played well against Forest and had Sarr who really has to be playing if we go with a back three. If he's out then it's pretty pointless playing that formation with the other centre backs available. Without doubt the frustrating thing is that we didn't change things up and were seemingly content with hoping that they don't score. I think it was only in the last five to ten minutes that Oshilaja moved to left back and Doughty went forward, pretty much in a 4-3-3. This still left us with three midfielders in the centre so didn't address the issue.
If we finish 21st Bowyer will have worked a miracle.
The fact that we have not done a 'reverse Liverpool' and finished mathematically bottom 3 by the end of February is a tremendous achievement by Bowyer given what he has had to work with.
Roland we know about but this new lot have not really pushed the boat out to help Bowyer either but the PR is good and people (want to) buy into it.
We all get pi**** off after a defeat, particularly one like tonight in time added on to time added on almost, yet are people seriously calling for Bowyer's head?
He's doing a tremendous job in circumstances that are adverse for all sorts of reasons.
Have to disagree somewhat. Whilst I agree Bowyer performed miracles to get a team to fight & scrap when he had no choice other than to play kids.........but now he has experienced players to pick from. Tonight is no different to many performances this season, esp away from home. Stoke & Middlesborough are just 2 I could mention- set up negatively & with no creativity and with the hope to try to nick a point. Not for me I'm afraid. Over the past week Barnsley have gone to Fulham & won 3-0. Luton beat Brentford at home & tonight Wigan won 3-0 at Reading. We havemt scored 3 goals away from home all season, and only a handful of times at home. We have had the least attempts at goal out of all 24 teams in this league. Pathetic. That's not down to playing kids. Or injuries. Or being tired. Or having a dodgy ref, a last minute free kick or not having the rub of the green. It's down to coaching & tactics.
For once I actually really do agree with @golfaddick
Away from home it hasn’t been good enough. Setting up to contain and nick a goal away at places like Forest, Leeds, Brentford, Fulham, West Brom, that’s fine and understandable. We got good results away at the top sides.
To try and do that away from home at the struggling teams, ones on horrific runs of form, ones at the bottom of the table. That’s simply not good enough.
We aren’t capable of regularly shutting out teams and we invite too much pressure on ourselves from negative football and a lack of real attacking intent. When teams have that problem, they have to just decide that you know what, we’re better off attacking teams and trying to score goals. Especially when part of our attack involves one of the best strikers in the league. Utilise that asset.
Our home form was always going to be crucial, and it will be that home form and results that will keep us up. But it’s the away form, performances, and set up that has drastically diminished our season as well as the run where we had so many players out.
It’s time to regroup and decide the best way to win games and get as many points as we possibly can is to actually attack teams more than defend against them. Because the reality is, when we do attack, we look good and the fact that we have the least shots in the division supports that we are good on the attack and need to do it far more than we already do.
I wouldn't take too much notice of Bowyer's comments. He's not going to tear a strip of the players in public but hopefully he was more realistic and honest with what he said in private in the dressing room afterwards.
one thing is for sure, make that 2 things .. the royal we need to pull up our collective socks for Huddersfield and Lapslie MUST start .. his pass setting up Taylor to hit the bar (what a sickener that was) was the best and most positive one of the night. And as usual, he was all over the place harrying the opposition. One blot was his silly, petulant, kicking the ball after the award of the free kick that led to the goal As for Bowyer, we all know that he is doing what he thinks is best and the reality is, despite a rubbish performance, and one goal conceded did flatter us, we came within a minute of getting a point. Looks to me that away from home our defensive mindset has become too deeply ingrained. The team at Huddersfield, whoever is selected, needs to go down fighting. Another totally inept attacking performance like last night will just not be acceptable .. we will see
Wasn't at the game, but reading this thread and the BBC and Sky Live Text, it seems another match we might have got something from...but didn't. In 21 games this season we've either dropped a point, or lost all 3 because the opposition have scored a goal, often late in the game
Watching matches I'm struck by how frequently we either should have played a back 5, and don't, or how often the midfield gets reshuffled. (Counting everyone with a shirt number we currently have 21 midfielders at the club...and 3 others, Gallagher, Kayal and Ledley have come and gone since last August).
There have been several occasions when I've struggled to see the logic in how the team is set up. If we'd held on in half the 21 games where we lost points by a single margin we'd currently be 8th, instead of 2 points above the drop zone.
Bowyer did a great job getting us out of League One but I think the jury must be out on how good a manager he is at Championship level. If we stay up...I'd be happy to conclude he is.
Wasn't at the game, but reading this thread and the BBC and Sky Live Text, it seems another match we might have got something from...but didn't. In 21 games this season we've either dropped a point, or lost all 3 because the opposition have scored a goal, often late in the game
Watching matches I'm struck by how frequently we either should have played a back 5, and don't, or how often the midfield gets reshuffled. (Counting everyone with a shirt number we currently have 21 midfielders at the club...and 3 others, Gallagher, Kayal and Ledley have come and gone since last August).
There have been several occasions when I've struggled to see the logic in how the team is set up. If we'd held on in half the 21 games where we lost points by a single margin we'd currently be 8th, instead of 2 points above the drop zone.
Bowyer did a great job getting us out of League One but I think the jury must be out on how good a manager he is at Championship level. If we stay up...I'd be happy to conclude he is.
If we stay up Bowyer deserves Manager of The Year given the shitty hand dealt him by Roland and ESI. Oh and that's before we consider the injuries and Gallagher.
Matt Southall sends nice tweets though so we'll all blame Bowyer instead and demand that he is sacked.
I sometimes think I live in a parallel universe to the rest of the world.
EDIT: I agree with you broadly @simonmatthews my rant is not directed at you for clarity even though I quoted you.
I wouldn't take too much notice of Bowyer's comments. He's not going to tear a strip of the players in public but hopefully he was more realistic and honest with what he said in private in the dressing room afterwards.
Don't think anyone was expecting or hoping he'd criticise the players, more that he'd take responsibility and admit he got it wrong.
Maybe denial and front is how Bowyer needs to cope with his own feelings of guilt? It was an awful interview but the proof is in how we play on Saturday
Maybe denial and front is how Bowyer needs to cope with his own feelings of guilt? It was an awful interview but the proof is in how we play on Saturday
I don't think Bowyer, in public anyway, looks beyond being literally seconds away from a point that 99% of people would have taken before the match. Hence his blinkered comments.
I wouldn't take too much notice of Bowyer's comments. He's not going to tear a strip of the players in public but hopefully he was more realistic and honest with what he said in private in the dressing room afterwards.
Switched off again Taylor still running back for the free kick and we should have not been letting them take it until he was back. Stand over the ball take the card.
Ball is then pumped in our defender has a 2 on 1 situation.
After sleeping on it woke up feeling a bit better. I am still concerned, the tactics and performance not good last night but if you had giving me the points tally for February on jan 31st I would of taken it.
Reading, Hull and Middlesbrough are all in a rot and will be panicking just as much as us, at least we have been picking up some points.
This team might not be the best and lack concentration but they don’t lack heart and guts, they have shown us time again that they can recover from set backs and need to do that again.
Its on a knife edge and think will be a lot more twist and turns yet which will test our nerves but it was never ever going to be easy this season.
Did we play well last night...... no. did we deserve a point yes we did. most of Wednesdays shots were off target and you could also see their lack of confidence. if Lyle Taylor’s shot that hit the Bar or his amazing blocked strike had gone in then game probably over.
what was annoying was the amount of balls we gave away and our poor passing. we are missing Pratley in midfield.
i have to agree with Bowyer I did not think it was a free kick to Sheffield after 4 added on minutes were up.
Finally, i respect all Charlton fans but I think some are being a little unfair or negative towards Lee Bowyer to be honest who is a good manager and should still keep us up 👍👍
Come on you Reds !!
You cant blame a defeat on ONE free kick, no matter how soft it might have been......and its not as if it was on the edge if the box & the taker scored direct.
Wasn't at the game, but reading this thread and the BBC and Sky Live Text, it seems another match we might have got something from...but didn't. In 21 games this season we've either dropped a point, or lost all 3 because the opposition have scored a goal, often late in the game
Watching matches I'm struck by how frequently we either should have played a back 5, and don't, or how often the midfield gets reshuffled. (Counting everyone with a shirt number we currently have 21 midfielders at the club...and 3 others, Gallagher, Kayal and Ledley have come and gone since last August).
There have been several occasions when I've struggled to see the logic in how the team is set up. If we'd held on in half the 21 games where we lost points by a single margin we'd currently be 8th, instead of 2 points above the drop zone.
Bowyer did a great job getting us out of League One but I think the jury must be out on how good a manager he is at Championship level. If we stay up...I'd be happy to conclude he is.
If we stay up Bowyer deserves Manager of The Year given the shitty hand dealt him by Roland and ESI. Oh and that's before we consider the injuries and Gallagher.
Matt Southall sends nice tweets though so we'll all blame Bowyer instead and demand that he is sacked.
I sometimes think I live in a parallel universe to the rest of the world.
EDIT: I agree with you broadly @simonmatthews my rant is not directed at you for clarity even though I quoted you.
I blame Bowyer for last night as he picked the team, the formation & the tactics.
If we get relegated (and that is looking more than 50% likely) then I will blame ESI. We are in a worse position now (in terms of the table & clubs below us) than we were 4-6 weeks ago.
And just to think, they "delayed" actually spending any money on buying the Valley & SL so they could concentrate on the Transfer Window.
And as in the immortal words of Jonny Rotten......
Did we play well last night...... no. did we deserve a point yes we did. most of Wednesdays shots were off target and you could also see their lack of confidence. if Lyle Taylor’s shot that hit the Bar or his amazing blocked strike had gone in then game probably over.
what was annoying was the amount of balls we gave away and our poor passing. we are missing Pratley in midfield.
i have to agree with Bowyer I did not think it was a free kick to Sheffield after 4 added on minutes were up.
Finally, i respect all Charlton fans but I think some are being a little unfair or negative towards Lee Bowyer to be honest who is a good manager and should still keep us up 👍👍
Come on you Reds !!
You cant blame a defeat on ONE free kick, no matter how soft it might have been......and its not as if it was on the edge if the box & the taker scored direct.
No you cannot correct but it was not a free kick and it was 0-0 at 94 minutes. respect what you said and agree our performance was poor, but sometimes you need a bit of luck to win or draw ugly. now the pressure has been escalated further.
I woke up very frustrated. I'm definitely not in the Bowyer out camp, not even close, but we've gone to a team who haven't won since December, hadn't scored at home in 2020 and have recently been knobbed off by Hull, Wigan, Luton, Stoke and Reading. They've been handing out three points to all our nearest rivals and we've turned up with three at the back, including a player who had a total mare just the game before, and sat back despite Weds looking terrified from the first minute. You could actually see their confidence grow in the first half once they realised we were more pathetic than them on the night. Second half they came out knowing they could win and we may as well have not come out. Despite that Bowyer didn't change anything, let it happen and even when he made changes they were bizarre or too late. And then he has the gall to say we were 'robbed' of a point when we were lucky to even be in the game at that point, and shouldn't be bemoaning losing a point against a team who were more than willing to hand over three from the start. We've been joking about the WLWLW record but we really, really need to beat Huddersfield now to stop this from being a real, possibly season-turning disaster.
Best post match summary of the situation IMO.
I could explain away the losses to Stoke and Blackburn (they have good recent form, they're just better than us, etc.) but last night there was no reason other than the negative tactics.
SWFC were there for the taking but we stuck rigidly to a pre-match plan and never once did the manager look like he was going to properly mix it up. Such a rigid tactic was necessary against Forest and it worked but it was very much not necessary last night. Wednesday were poor and we let them batter us.
I never expected to say that about a Lee Bowyer team.
Comments
A lot of players went missing last night
Davis oztumer and bonne
Doughty had a stinker but to his credit he didn't hide
and the manager made some poor choices...for instance good choice to move doughty up into midfield but poor choice not to sub oshilaja for purrington
I would have made substitutions earlier anyway
Realistically this was always going to be a tough season ...provided we can stay up the new owners have a lot of rebuilding to do in the close season...
That's when Mr Southall and his chums will be judged
Never been confident that we can stay up this season and the way we are playing it looks like we won't.
I do sometime worry that away from home Bowyer either doesn't see things, or isn't able to do anything about it. We've earned 4 points out of the last 24 available, it's not working.
It's just that we played badly. Our forward passing was poor and we often looked for sideways or backwards passes from midfield. Bonne couldn't hold the ball up and if we were settling for a draw late on, then Hemed should've come on because at least he was another big man to mark their big men.
Oshilaja did a good job defensively but it was plain to see that he had no out ball because he's right-footed. We miss Sarr badly because he's easily the most penetrative passer we have.
did we deserve a point yes we did.
most of Wednesdays shots were off target and you could also see their lack of confidence.
if Lyle Taylor’s shot that hit the Bar or his amazing
blocked strike had gone in then game probably over.
what was annoying was the amount of balls we gave away and our poor passing.
we are missing Pratley in midfield.
i have to agree with Bowyer I did not think it was a free kick to Sheffield after 4 added on minutes were up.
Finally, i respect all Charlton fans but I think some are being a little unfair or negative towards Lee Bowyer to be honest who is a good manager and should still keep us up 👍👍
Come on you Reds !!
Without doubt the frustrating thing is that we didn't change things up and were seemingly content with hoping that they don't score. I think it was only in the last five to ten minutes that Oshilaja moved to left back and Doughty went forward, pretty much in a 4-3-3. This still left us with three midfielders in the centre so didn't address the issue.
and why did he not give our Irish International AM a
run out ?
What do you mean we're not the blue team?
Away from home it hasn’t been good enough. Setting up to contain and nick a goal away at places like Forest, Leeds, Brentford, Fulham, West Brom, that’s fine and understandable. We got good results away at the top sides.
To try and do that away from home at the struggling teams, ones on horrific runs of form, ones at the bottom of the table. That’s simply not good enough.
We aren’t capable of regularly shutting out teams and we invite too much pressure on ourselves from negative football and a lack of real attacking intent. When teams have that problem, they have to just decide that you know what, we’re better off attacking teams and trying to score goals. Especially when part of our attack involves one of the best strikers in the league. Utilise that asset.
Our home form was always going to be crucial, and it will be that home form and results that will keep us up. But it’s the away form, performances, and set up that has drastically diminished our season as well as the run where we had so many players out.
It’s time to regroup and decide the best way to win games and get as many points as we possibly can is to actually attack teams more than defend against them. Because the reality is, when we do attack, we look good and the fact that we have the least shots in the division supports that we are good on the attack and need to do it far more than we already do.
As for Bowyer, we all know that he is doing what he thinks is best and the reality is, despite a rubbish performance, and one goal conceded did flatter us, we came within a minute of getting a point. Looks to me that away from home our defensive mindset has become too deeply ingrained. The team at Huddersfield, whoever is selected, needs to go down fighting. Another totally inept attacking performance like last night will just not be acceptable .. we will see
Matt Southall sends nice tweets though so we'll all blame Bowyer instead and demand that he is sacked.
I sometimes think I live in a parallel universe to the rest of the world.
EDIT: I agree with you broadly @simonmatthews my rant is not directed at you for clarity even though I quoted you.
Ball is then pumped in our defender has a 2 on 1 situation.
Must see these games out better
If we get relegated (and that is looking more than 50% likely) then I will blame ESI. We are in a worse position now (in terms of the table & clubs below us) than we were 4-6 weeks ago.
And just to think, they "delayed" actually spending any money on buying the Valley & SL so they could concentrate on the Transfer Window.
And as in the immortal words of Jonny Rotten......
Ever feel like you've been cheated
Lows too low
Hey ho Charlton Life.
Bowyer in - but timewasting out. Play the game and play it fairly otherwise you deserve unfair decisions.
but it was not a free kick and it was 0-0 at 94 minutes.
respect what you said and agree our performance was poor, but sometimes you need a bit of luck to win or draw ugly.
now the pressure has been escalated further.