Why does T.Campbell keep getting selected

ateamofcorygibbs said:

Bloke behind me at Coventry constantly shouting that TC is 'lazy' (not the first time I've heard this). Whatever faults he has he obviously tries and tries, runs all game (and often ends up looking knackered at as a result) - it's just bizarre as a criticism. He's probably done more minutes than most of our outfield players this season? There are obvious limitations to his game (he's still young and improving) but imo the effort he gives for the team is not in question. 

It’s just stupid, none of our players are lazy, because if they were then Jones wouldn’t have them. But TC is probably one of the players that criticism applies least to, I think other than maybe Coventry he probably covers more ground than most of our other players per game

I think a lot of people don’t see the benefits TC brings to the team, we are a better team with him on the pitch than we are without him on because of what he offers, even when he’s not playing well. A few examples of this below 


This is from Derby away. Where TC does what he does a lot of the time, and attracts 2 players to him. Oppositions are very aware of his threat, and therefore very rarely leave him 1v1. TC would be a lot more effective if we were better as a team at moving the ball quickly to him so that he’s 1v1, but that’s a different issue. Here you can see that we have 6 attacking players, Derby have 6 defenders back, should be a comfortable situation for the defence. But because 2 of them are on TC that leaves Bree free at the back post to score unmarked. He’s not done anything special other than carry the ball and play a decent pass inside, but just having TC on the pitch means we can score that goal. 

He gets selected for the song, so he'd better score a goal soon to keep it going. We also need a Portuguese player for that same reason.

CAFC_boi said:

arny23394 said:

Diebythesword said:

If we don’t want him I’m sure there’s a few championship clubs that would be happy to take a 22 year old international with 120 appearances off our hands… 

9 goals and 8 assists in those 122 games…

If that’s true - that’s absolutely shocking - considering he scored two in one game once that’s 7 goals in 121 games - that’s less than 3 goals a season as a forward! 

It's not that fair an assessment though (and also the stats are wrong). In 21/22 he played 4 minutes across 2 games. In 22/23 aged 19 he made 22 appearances in L1, 13 of which were starts as he won over Dean Holden towards the end of the season. He got 2 goals and 1 assist that season playing as a winger in a team that was capable of winning 6-0 and then losing 6-0 two weeks later. The next season he made 33 appearances, only 13 of them starts. He was a winger for Holden and then weirdly a 10 for Appleton before becoming a spare part under Jones and getting hardly any minutes. He got 5 assists and 2 goals in that time including 4 goal contributions across 3 games before randomly getting dropped again by the second worst manager in Charlton's history. Last season he was played up front in a static 352 that wasn't working before we switched to a role that had him as a hybrid winger/striker where he scored in his first two games playing in that system. He made 44 appearances, scored 7 goals with 1 assist and was key to our promotion playing in a side that generally scored few goals and kept things tight. This season he has 2 assists in 18 games in the Championship in a season where we were doing brilliantly until the recent difficult run.

In that time despite only being 22 he has played in multiple different roles under 5 different managers and 2 caretakers. He's been asked to be a winger on either flank, a 10, a striker and a winger/striker, all of which ask something different of him. Sometimes he's asked to be a wingback because of a lack of adequate squad cover. He has seen himself part of a squad with 3 absolutely disastrous managers, one of whom at least believed in him and saw him start to flourish as a teenager before getting booted and then one that kicked his confidence so badly he was on the verge of leaving on a free at the end of that season before Jones decided there was enough potential to keep him. It's fair enough not to rate him if you don't, but you need to add context to his number of appearances and goal contributions because he has done that as a kid playing for an absolute basket case club where he's been asked to play all over the pitch and graft like no winger normally is required to. It's only really under Jones that I would judge him and we wouldn't have got promoted without him and what he offers beyond goals and assists. No scouting team was looking at his goals per season when they were assessing him as worth bids in January (and would have again in the summer if we hadn't gone up)

I just read on Cawley's substack that TC hasn't scored in 24 games, stretching back to April last year. For the areas he gets into, I'm sure TC would agree that it's not good enough. 

I would never doubt that he offers more to the team than goals, but he does need to offer a few goals as well. 

For those that don’t think TC is good enough or should be dropped. What would you say TC’s job in the team is? 

TC would be higher than 12th for attackers if he lifted his head more often and attempted to cross to Charlton players rather than just crossing without looking.

I’m fine with TC but I do feel he deserves a bit of a rest and maybe perhaps start on the bench for a game or two.

Anyway I trust Nathan and believe he knows best and is more right than wrong.

NabySarr said:

For those that don’t think TC is good enough or should be dropped. What would you say TC’s job in the team is? 

For me his role is: 

- Be an outlet and get the team up the pitch ✅
- create chances ✅
- press from the front but also help tracking the opposition right back when needed ✅
- chip in with some goals ❌

This season he’s doing 3 of those 4 pretty well, and those are probably the 3 Jones wants him to do the most. 3 of them are also much harder to do when playing at wing back which is where he has spent time playing in nearly every game recently 

I just don’t see why there is so much talk about his place in the team or at this level when he’s doing most of his role pretty well and just lacking goals 

What he was doing well he has stopped doing, he is now being snuffed out and is becoming ineffective, if he’s meant to be a striker he doesn’t score enough and if he’s meant to be a winger he doesn’t assist enough. He was more successful in league 1 because of the quality of opposition and didn’t always impress at that level.in the champ he is proving to not have made the step up. The sooner he learns to pass,cross and shoot at a more consistent level the better.

I have zero issue with his work rate or effort, and I would never call him lazy or not trying, but he's simply not doing enough. How many minutes have Leaburn and Campbell had this season compared to Olaofe and Knibbs? Guarantee it will be a massive difference in favour of the former and yet the latter two have somehow scored more

Sword65pf said:

Covered End said:

TC was awful yesterday, he barely found a Charlton player all game.
He either passed the ball to an open space that Coventry (team) collected or he passed to them.
He's clearly exhausted (not surprising since I think he's featured in most every game and started nearly all).

He needs to be rested, put him on the bench and bring him on in the second half for a game or two.
I'd give Apter a chance in his place, but whoever starts in his place, give TC a rest he deserves it.

I said this during the thread yesterday and upset a few for it. Made a couple of comments in jest that were taken as insults, which although someone was being soft wasn’t my intention., but back to TC, his passing and end product are far from being close to good enough he’s made a lot of appearances at a young age  so should have improved and he hasn’t in these aspects of his game.

I've been a big fan of TC since he first broke into the first team. He brings a sense of excitement and expectancy, that no other current player can deliver.

I want to see him push on, not go backwards.
Unfortunately, I do wonder if Jones has inadvertently put too much pressure on him by firstly bigging him up, saying that he was potentially Premier League class, then trying to convert him into a striker.

We saw a brief flurry of goals, but he hasn't been the same since.

So just when everyone thought that he was about to kick on, and move up a level, he has instead gone backwards.

It seems to me that he has suffered from being overplayed, whilst at the same time having to deal with International call ups.

He appears to be a quiet, shy lad, who maybe finds it difficult to deal with too much pressure, and someone whose confidence can be badly affected by the kind of adverse criticism that he's currently receiving.

If he was at another club, with a deeper squad, he'd have probably been rested many weeks ago and would have benefited greatly from that.

In summary I'd like to see his game time better managed for his own good.

queensland_addick said:

Sword65pf said:

Covered End said:

TC was awful yesterday, he barely found a Charlton player all game.
He either passed the ball to an open space that Coventry (team) collected or he passed to them.
He's clearly exhausted (not surprising since I think he's featured in most every game and started nearly all).

He needs to be rested, put him on the bench and bring him on in the second half for a game or two.
I'd give Apter a chance in his place, but whoever starts in his place, give TC a rest he deserves it.

I said this during the thread yesterday and upset a few for it. Made a couple of comments in jest that were taken as insults, which although someone was being soft wasn’t my intention., but back to TC, his passing and end product are far from being close to good enough he’s made a lot of appearances at a young age  so should have improved and he hasn’t in these aspects of his game.

I've been a big fan of TC since he first broke into the first team. He brings a sense of excitement and expectancy, that no other current player can deliver.

I want to see him push on, not go backwards.
Unfortunately, I do wonder if Jones has inadvertently put too much pressure on him by firstly bigging him up, saying that he was potentially Premier League class, then trying to convert him into a striker.

We saw a brief flurry of goals, but he hasn't been the same since.

So just when everyone thought that he was about to kick on, and move up a level, he has instead gone backwards.

It seems to me that he has suffered from being overplayed, whilst at the same time having to deal with International call ups.

He appears to be a quiet, shy lad, who maybe finds it difficult to deal with too much pressure, and someone whose confidence can be badly affected by the kind of adverse criticism that he's currently receiving.

If he was at another club, with a deeper squad, he'd have probably been rested many weeks ago and would have benefited greatly from that.

In summary I'd like to see his game time better managed for his own good.

I think you have pretty much hit the nail on the head here, I can tell you from meeting him a couple of times one being the junior reds Xmas party that he is an extremely shy, lovely fella. Also agree that NJ trying to make him a striker IMO hasn’t helped, obviously NJ is more qualified to make that judgement. But we aren’t seeing the experiment bearing much fruit.

He's being played out of position, he's a winger in a front 3. 

He's never a wingback, never a striker, his strength lays out wide. He's being used incorrectly. Not a single goal to his name after 18 appearances and 1300+ minutes of football. 

Fairly confident if we played a front 3 of TC, Tanto and Apter, we would see more positive attacking play than what we are currently seeing. 

Is definitely the most frustrating player we have atm alongside Leaburn though.