Charlton v Stoke | Sat 10 Aug 2019 | 3pm KO | POST-MATCH THREAD

Bowyer is carrying on from last season and he’s building something special. We will compete in this league. We have a team that won’t give up. He knows what you need in a winning team. It’s shows in the type of midfielders he brings in - energetic, mobile, skilful and aggressive. Gallagher looks a great prospect and I can’t wait to see Field and Kayal. We had promising starts under Peeters and Luzon, but I can feel this is very different.

We won today with Aneke coming off the bench, Field, Kayal and Morgan not even in the squad. We’re looking to add a right back and hopefully Hemed or another striker.

Opponents and their fans will underestimate us. Clubs with recent Prem history in particular will expect to dominate possession. Their fans will get frustrated because we’ll fight for every ball and nick goals against the run of play. Even if they do control the game we’ll find ways into games, we have players who will create chances.

Our goals today were the type of goals we were scoring throughout last season -

Taylor’s a quick attack from the back. We’ll catch teams out when space opens up like that. Bowyer teams pass out from the back, but they also know when to go more direct and up the tempo. Nice to see long pass from Leko set up the goal, a player who you might imagine gets his head down and runs rather than picks out a ball like that. Brilliant to see Taylor score, especially like that after all that’s happened recently.

Watch Aneke’s in full if you can. Williams drives into the box to try to create a cut back. It doesn’t come off so Cullen tried exactly the same thing and it came off. It’s clearly a way Bowyer wants them to attack because it’s so effective. We scored goals and won penalties doing just that all season long last year. We have midfielders and attackers who can pass and dribble their way into those positions. One reason it’s so dangerous is that you don’t need top strikers to score those chances. It’s about getting those players into the right areas and reacting before the opposition do.

Gallagher’s goal came from a set piece. From stats I remember seeing late last season we perhaps surprisingly were one of the top scorers in the league from either corners or set pieces.

Powell was the best manager since Curbs and did a very good job for us, but Bowyer has overtaken him. He’s a genius and is our best chance of experiencing that sort of success again. We’re competitive but play good football and it’s far better than any of that tippy tappy stuff the likes of Robinson and Peeters tried to play.

We’re going over achieve in terms of our budget. Maybe that will only mean lower mid table but whatever happens it’ll be a season to remember. Whether you’re going to games or watching streams do whatever you can to make sure you see as much as you can. It might even mean the play-offs again. With the madness of the past five years the chances of another bizarre and ridiculous twist in which Roland owns the club as we march back into the Premier League with a tiny budget can’t be completely ruled out.