I am celebrating like so many on here, its great to get a win, away win even better.
We played soo well, but the flip side of the coin is could the Wigan team have been worse prepared, organised, selected than they were? I don't think so.
How could their manager have watched the last 2 CAFC games and thought I'll not bother pressing a fragile CAFC defence? I'll change my winning team by 3 players who don't seem to be interested.
1st half Wigan passing was sloppy from the start, there was no energy in the midfield , we were picking up 2nd balls unchallenged. Our passing was good.
2nd half we came under pressure and the same familiar problems came back with the Wigan team being much better than their 1st half building. their momentum . Our passing became more erratic/misjudged as the half progressed.
The badly misjudged square pass by Dobson could have changed the momentum even sooner, we were extremely lucky at that point that Wigan didn't make more of that.
Please contrast with Bolton game were they sat on 0-2 lead (and as we didn't score) coasted home.
imo the pattern is set- when we can play, pass etc freely we get a good result. We aren't tough enough to handle pressure- ie drilled to play solid passing football that retains the ball and gets us into the other half, and tackle and harass the opposition to win the ball back.
In the end you can only beat the team in front of you. I'm enjoying the result as much as any body else.
I thought last nights performance summed us up pretty well as to what we are as a team. When Appleton gets the team selection correct we have goals in this group of players. Unfortunately at the back we are always likely to concede. Bring in a couple of decent defender's in January and we might just have a decent season.
This. In almost every match you see both of what makes us a good side and what makes us a mid table side. Best case scenario is we can stay within distance of play offs and have a good window to turn these close matches into Charlton wins.
Didn’t follow the game, except from the score but shame to lose Camera to injury. Imagine Mcgrandles will be back in the squad soon for a 6 week audition before the window reopens.
Cigars and champagne at the Ritz to drinking meths with the dossers in cardboard city. We were so vulnerable in the last 10 minutes and added time after the changes.
If your starting 11 is important, so is the 11 on the pitch at the business end of a match.
Cafc played some great football and used the width of the pitch so well in that 1st half with Dobson and Louie Watson pulling the strings. Decent game management for most of the 2nd half until their subs saw a big improvement in Wigan and we were the polar opposite with reserves.
With a resurgent Pompey at the top of the table and our next league game, the away win was vital last night.
The injury curse continues and the January window will determine if we can kick on from mid table.
Agree with a lot of what @KingKinsella says above. What I would say is that now we’ve shown we can attack and win games going forward hopefully MA can spend some time on the training ground teaching passing patterns for possession retention when we’re ahead. I know that feels like it should be second nature but lots of this squad haven’t played together and those who have haven’t won comfortably very often.
Watched on the stream, an excellent 80 minutes, then with Thomas and mainly Kirk on we go to pieces. Kirk completely bottled challenge for the Wigan 2nd goal, hope Appleton noted that, perhaps we can give him away in January (Kirk that is)!
Easy to blame Kirk but he didn’t bottle the challenge he just didn’t close down and allowed the bloke inside to score. But before that Hector had dangled a foot at the ball and Fraser and Jones had a gentlemen’s excuse me. Not saying Kirk wasnt at fault but so were others.
I agree. Kirk reacted half a second too late because he's a bit dozy and that gave the attacker the space to go past him. Kirk did the right thing in closing the attacker down, which is genuine progress for him, but he should have been more switched on. At that point though he other lets the bloke past him or brings him down for a penalty so we're in trouble either way. I'm much more annoyed at the fact a gentle pass along the floor managed to go from the byline to the other side of our box without any of our defenders showing the faintest interest in stopping it. Kirk's the least annoying part of that goal for me.
Watched on the stream, an excellent 80 minutes, then with Thomas and mainly Kirk on we go to pieces. Kirk completely bottled challenge for the Wigan 2nd goal, hope Appleton noted that, perhaps we can give him away in January (Kirk that is)!
Easy to blame Kirk but he didn’t bottle the challenge he just didn’t close down and allowed the bloke inside to score. But before that Hector had dangled a foot at the ball and Fraser and Jones had a gentlemen’s excuse me. Not saying Kirk wasnt at fault but so were others.
I agree. Kirk reacted half a second too late because he's a bit dozy and that gave the attacker the space to go past him. Kirk did the right thing in closing the attacker down, which is genuine progress for him, but he should have been more switched on. At that point though he other lets the bloke past him or brings him down for a penalty so we're in trouble either way. I'm much more annoyed at the fact a gentle pass along the floor managed to go from the byline to the other side of our box without any of our defenders showing the faintest interest in stopping it. Kirk's the least annoying part of that goal for me.
Spot on. If that was CBT (or most wingers for that matter) the outcome would have been the same the moment that ball somehow got across our box. Some will blame Kirk regardless which I don't think is very fair.
Firstly, do hope a large portion of humble pie is on the menu this morning for majority of posters on the pre-match thread yesterday
All jokes aside, I don't think anyone was expecting that 1st half performance. We were brilliant!
A couple of points I took away from the game....
I thought the defence looked resolute, assured and for first time in a while, balanced. For all the criticism that has been directed at them recently, they more than stepped up to the plate last night. Especially Hector.
The attacking players and midfielders were a thorn in their defence's side all game, pressing and closing down was really good.
My take on Kirk, being blamed for the goal last night, is that it is pretty harsh. If their player wasn't able to get around the defenders in the corner, Hector wasn't to miss the cross, he wouldn't have had to get across the player in the first place. Don't think he is anymore to blame there than anyone else personally - just my opinion.
Fraser has all of a sudden turned into a bit of a scapegoat, not sure what that's all about. Think some people are forgetting he's probably still gaining match fitness after a long-ish injury lay off. Also, wasn't that long ago that he was our main goal contribution from midfield.
Yes we made it a nervy ending, could of been avoided of course, but 2-3 completely flattered Wigan in my view and we dominated that game.
Wasn't sitting too for away from a guy who spent the entire time, up until he scored I'll add, calling CBT a lazy ****. You just can't please everyone can you but did have a chuckle to myself and a glance over when the ball hit the back of the net.
I predicted a 2-2 draw, so am over the moon with the 3 points. Really hope we kick on now.
The highlight of the match was the passage of play leading up to the third goal, started by a calm composed pass from Dobson to Leaburn, and the wonderful deft touch inside into CBT 's path to score a very well taken goal... A great overall team performance and well deserved three points
Quote from their forum: "Clare - think he should've picked up May for his first and switched off to give Blackett-Taylor space for their third. Not convincing."
Only saw the first hour so cannot comment on what came later. A few observations.
Wigan were shyte but we were very very good. Leaburn needed a decent performance. He got away with a few very nearly bad touches which ended up being just good enough (e.g, his assist for CBT) which on another day would have made him look clumsy but his all round performance was a massive improvement.
L Watson must be a permanent starter. Appleton has explained his reservations but we frankly do not have another option at the same standard as this lad. Permanent deal please.
Kirk unfortunately is becoming a self fulfilling prophecy. The less we play him and the more he stinks the place out when he does, the harder it is to get rid as we surely must. Whoever was responsible for that signing should hang their heads.
We might be unusually rich in numbers but we are low in quality. Despite recent improvements we do not have promotion worthy full backs and our centre halfs are flaky. Our loans, L Watson. Aside, have been a disaster. C Campbell must have something on Appleton, Tedic appears to be a dud despite his provenance and Abankwa was clearly a desperation signing. Cant even blame Sandgaard Jr unfortunately.
If we lose any of Dobson, CBT or Alfy to injury or the transfer window we are totally stuffed. True of most sides if you take their best three players out but we are so dependent on these guys it’s unreal.
Quote from their forum: "Clare - think he should've picked up May for his first and switched off to give Blackett-Taylor space for their third. Not convincing."
A better performance than Saturday although Wigan are a struggling side. If we hadn’t had beaten them then real questions may have been asked.
Main question is why Kirk is anywhere near the first team. He doesn’t want to be here and it shows. We need to offload him in Jan or just freeze him out the set up. He’s garbage stealing his wage.
That win takes us 5 points off of a playoff place which puts us in with a real chance of making them Still early days but we are definitely in the running
Bit harsh to call Tedic a dud @Sillybilly. He's a striker, how many games has he started up front...? He's being kept out of the team by Alfie May and a brilliant young Leaburn. He's never looked bad when he has played. Think he was signed when 352 was the plan in which case he'd have played a lot more. He could still have a role to play this season.
We need to address this full back situation (especially LB) so we don't have a VB bumbling around there. Watson played fine, but a good left footed full back, we still await.
Could have smashed Lincoln if we played like this, but they didn't fancy the battle that day. Thye just want to keep us on edge and interested.
Kudos to Apples for the starting 11. The first half was the best away since the first 45 against Millwall preseason. Movement was excellent and all the touches and tackles were coming off to order. Dobbo and L Watson were running the show and young Leaburn was enjoying himself. May was being May - brilliant. The pitch appeared enormous and the men in black appeared to have space and time to do what they liked. Wigan were awful. Their manager got it very wrong.
Three very different but excellent goals to the good, Apples was probably right to bring off players to rest them and avoid injury (CBT looked tight as he walked off). There was a day when we had a Pratley on the bench ready to come on and close things down but putting rather ineffective replacements on nearly cost us dearly. None added to the defensive set up and with Dobbo tiring and Hector starting to lose concentration Wigan nearly stole a point.
We talk about getting exciting, attacking forwards and have been successful in this with the acquisition of May. But maybe in January what we really need is a hardened old pro who can play for 20 mins at the tail end of games and stamp down on any attacking nonsense from the opposition.
I'm quite pleased with that, and Apples knows his onions.
Trying to get rid of the Turnips are the main problems so we can return to our salad days and reap the rewards of the fruits of our labour. We've had too many Granny Smith's in our teams in recent seasons and until we get back to core values, we wont have a golden delicious future. It would be sheer Ambrosia if Apples can shine and not crumble.
That was a great game to watch and be a Charlton fan, didn't they do well, really well, much more like it than the Lincoln game last week for sure and the Bolton one too, although I didn't see that one. Away from home after losing 2 on the spin, 3-0 up past the 80th minute and seeing out the game, albeit a bit creakily, that's best tenner I've done in a while. Must have been great for the squad and for our travelling fans.
I think when MA looks critically at their goals he'll see the 2 subs, Fraser and Kirk, didn't help things defensively. Fraser could have anticipated and filled the gap between Asiimwe and Dobson and tracked the runner who helped set up their first goal. For their second he could have shouted Jones out of the way and booted the cross ball into row Z. Kirk, well, his anticipation and blocking of their goal scorer was second rate.
A great 3 points on the road and almost but not quite worth the long wait.
Surely now Appleton knows everything he needs to know about Kirk and Fraser? Replacing very tired players they made things demonstrably worse Each was at least partially culpable for Wigan's goals Are Chem Campbell and Karoy Anderson really less worthy of places even on the bench? I'm not buying Apple's line about he's just got too many to choose from in midfield, when some that he does choose let him down this badly
All the recent benchwarmers and unselected chaps will presumably get their chance to shine against CVPM and then Sutton on 14th, surely by then Apples will have taken off the blinkers. Not too many chances for defenders to get a break but it's clear they all still need the practice.
I guess our midfield sub was forced due to Camara's injury after 10mins. We probably would have started with Karoy on the bench instead of Kirk if had foreseen a substitution so soon into the game.
Is it ok now to remind ourselves that the 4 long term injured players, Aneke, T Taylor, Edun and now Camara, all had injury issues pre season. They all occupy positions, left back, defensive midfield, attacking midfield and striker, that we do not really have adequate other backup options for. You could add MacGrandles to that list as well. Just saying that when January comes around please no signings 'coming back from injury'.
Excellent for 83 minutes, but the final subs really affected us. I was baffled why Kirk and Tedic came on instead of one of them and Ness, as we ended up being very light in midfield after L Watson came off. Ness would have done a better job in protecting the defence.
What the team and bench selection does show is how little Appleton thinks of 3 of our loan signings, with Tedic having a token cameo, while Chem and Abankwah didn't even make the 18.
Chem Campbell is a funny one - obviously I'm not a manager/coach and don't see him in training every day, but he looked decent to me and potentially a good option to come on against tried legs etc.
I'm quite pleased with that, and Apples knows his onions.
Trying to get rid of the Turnips are the main problems so we can return to our salad days and reap the rewards of the fruits of our labour. We've had too many Granny Smith's in our teams in recent seasons and until we get back to core values, we wont have a golden delicious future. It would be sheer Ambrosia if Apples can shine and not crumble.
That's got all the puns out of the way in one mouthfull of goodies...🙄
Always feel you need a bit of luck at some point, that free kick against the bar was it for me, well deserved three points despite the late scare, good game.
Superb first 45 minutes and realistically we’re never going to play like that for 90 but we do need to achieve that level for 70 minutes. If we can reach that level of consistency then we’ll win more than we lose but it’s hard to see that with our current Jekyll and Hyde performances.
Comments
We played soo well, but the flip side of the coin is could the Wigan team have been worse prepared, organised, selected than they were? I don't think so.
How could their manager have watched the last 2 CAFC games and thought I'll not bother pressing a fragile CAFC defence? I'll change my winning team by 3 players who don't seem to be interested.
1st half Wigan passing was sloppy from the start, there was no energy in the midfield , we were picking up 2nd balls unchallenged. Our passing was good.
2nd half we came under pressure and the same familiar problems came back with the Wigan team being much better than their 1st half building. their momentum . Our passing became more erratic/misjudged as the half progressed.
The badly misjudged square pass by Dobson could have changed the momentum even sooner, we were extremely lucky at that point that Wigan didn't make more of that.
Please contrast with Bolton game were they sat on 0-2 lead (and as we didn't score) coasted home.
imo the pattern is set- when we can play, pass etc freely we get a good result. We aren't tough enough to handle pressure- ie drilled to play solid passing football that retains the ball and gets us into the other half, and tackle and harass the opposition to win the ball back.
In the end you can only beat the team in front of you. I'm enjoying the result as much as any body else.
Cigars and champagne at the Ritz to drinking meths with the dossers in cardboard city.
We were so vulnerable in the last 10 minutes and added time after the changes.
If your starting 11 is important, so is the 11 on the pitch at the business end of a match.
Cafc played some great football and used the width of the pitch so well in that 1st half with Dobson and Louie Watson pulling the strings. Decent game management for most of the 2nd half until their subs saw a big improvement in Wigan and we were the polar opposite with reserves.
With a resurgent Pompey at the top of the table and our next league game, the away win was vital last night.
The injury curse continues and the January window will determine if we can kick on from mid table.
Some will blame Kirk regardless which I don't think is very fair.
Firstly, do hope a large portion of humble pie is on the menu this morning for majority of posters on the pre-match thread yesterday
All jokes aside, I don't think anyone was expecting that 1st half performance. We were brilliant!
A couple of points I took away from the game....
I thought the defence looked resolute, assured and for first time in a while, balanced. For all the criticism that has been directed at them recently, they more than stepped up to the plate last night. Especially Hector.
The attacking players and midfielders were a thorn in their defence's side all game, pressing and closing down was really good.
My take on Kirk, being blamed for the goal last night, is that it is pretty harsh. If their player wasn't able to get around the defenders in the corner, Hector wasn't to miss the cross, he wouldn't have had to get across the player in the first place. Don't think he is anymore to blame there than anyone else personally - just my opinion.
Fraser has all of a sudden turned into a bit of a scapegoat, not sure what that's all about. Think some people are forgetting he's probably still gaining match fitness after a long-ish injury lay off. Also, wasn't that long ago that he was our main goal contribution from midfield.
Yes we made it a nervy ending, could of been avoided of course, but 2-3 completely flattered Wigan in my view and we dominated that game.
Wasn't sitting too for away from a guy who spent the entire time, up until he scored I'll add, calling CBT a lazy ****. You just can't please everyone can you but did have a chuckle to myself and a glance over when the ball hit the back of the net.
I predicted a 2-2 draw, so am over the moon with the 3 points. Really hope we kick on now.
Onwards and upwards!!
A great overall team performance and well deserved three points
Sounds familiar
Still early days but we are definitely in the running
Could have smashed Lincoln if we played like this, but they didn't fancy the battle that day. Thye just want to keep us on edge and interested.
Three very different but excellent goals to the good, Apples was probably right to bring off players to rest them and avoid injury (CBT looked tight as he walked off). There was a day when we had a Pratley on the bench ready to come on and close things down but putting rather ineffective replacements on nearly cost us dearly. None added to the defensive set up and with Dobbo tiring and Hector starting to lose concentration Wigan nearly stole a point.
We talk about getting exciting, attacking forwards and have been successful in this with the acquisition of May. But maybe in January what we really need is a hardened old pro who can play for 20 mins at the tail end of games and stamp down on any attacking nonsense from the opposition.
Trying to get rid of the Turnips are the main problems so we can return to our salad days and reap the rewards of the fruits of our labour.
We've had too many Granny Smith's in our teams in recent seasons and until we get back to core values, we wont have a golden delicious future.
It would be sheer Ambrosia if Apples can shine and not crumble.
Must have been great for the squad and for our travelling fans.
I think when MA looks critically at their goals he'll see the 2 subs, Fraser and Kirk, didn't help things defensively. Fraser could have anticipated and filled the gap between Asiimwe and Dobson and tracked the runner who helped set up their first goal. For their second he could have shouted Jones out of the way and booted the cross ball into row Z. Kirk, well, his anticipation and blocking of their goal scorer was second rate.
A great 3 points on the road and almost but not quite worth the long wait.
On to the Cup draw next week :0)
Replacing very tired players they made things demonstrably worse
Each was at least partially culpable for Wigan's goals
Are Chem Campbell and Karoy Anderson really less worthy of places even on the bench?
I'm not buying Apple's line about he's just got too many to choose from in midfield, when some that he does choose let him down this badly
All the recent benchwarmers and unselected chaps will presumably get their chance to shine against CVPM and then Sutton on 14th, surely by then Apples will have taken off the blinkers.
Not too many chances for defenders to get a break but it's clear they all still need the practice.