MATCH THREAD: Spurs V Charlton Athletic: Carabao Cup (2): Wed 26 August 2026: 19:45 [+POST P37]

AFKABartram said:

EastStand said:

Meh. We simply don’t have the squad depth or quality to compete in the Champ AND a cup run. Best to do as we’ve done and get some good competitive minutes in for the B squad lads and crack on with the season. 

Why did we play such a strong side against Cheltenham then? 🤷‍♂️

As that was treated as basically our final pre season friendly.

Chunes said:

valleynick66 said:

Shame they didn’t tell fans in advance. Although Rodwell sort of did on TalkSPORT earlier today. 

NJ said it in the post-match interview after West Ham and in the pre-match before Spurs. 

After we’d sold out 

Everyone moaning about Jones making so many changes but you’d be hard pressed to find a Championship manager playing a PL team who hadn’t done that this week. Preston 8 changes against Everton for example. They can’t all be wrong. 

ForeverAddickted said:

AFKABartram said:

EastStand said:

Meh. We simply don’t have the squad depth or quality to compete in the Champ AND a cup run. Best to do as we’ve done and get some good competitive minutes in for the B squad lads and crack on with the season. 

Why did we play such a strong side against Cheltenham then? 🤷‍♂️

Because it got treated as a final Pre-Season game for those starting vs Derby the following week, especially as last night was the first time the eleven has been changed since. 

Jones treated last night like a pre season game too but instead we embarrassed ourselves infront of 60k including 6k of our own fans. If you don't give a monkeys about the cup play the kids in the first round and get knocked out. I get the need for changes but why not have some ammo on the bench 

Gravesend_Addick said:

Don't understand how the injures scupper a deal for JRS.   

PLAY Bell/mesik at cb short term or bring in a loan. 

Hopefully it's just disappointed talking straight after the game 

Because they are going to be long term, that is how it scuppers the JRS deal, as we have limited budget and now we need to find a good center back or two.

The only positive with the two injuries is that they've happened now and we're hopefully able to do something about it. Happens in a weeks time we'd be stuck. 

At the time when I saw the team while walking up to the stadium, I was thoroughly annoyed - thinking about it without the emotion it was the right call. I would have played Okonkwo instead of Brooks but it’s done now. The biggest concern for me is that the gap between the first and second XIs is worlds apart and any more injuries will leave us with some half arsed performances from some.

A bit deflated still from last night. It’s no biggie, agree with rotation and Preston more important, but you’ve still got to be competitive. Otherwise what was the point in putting a strong side out at Cheltenham and not giving 2nd, 3rd, 4th choice players game time then?

Athletico Charlton said:

Garrymanilow said:

I appreciate that it’s annoying not seeing the best lineup if you had a ticket but Jones made 10 changes and the one change he didn’t make resulted in an injury to that player potentially so devastating we might not be able to sign JRS as a result. The margins are so fine at this level across so many departments 

If you are going to make changes then change Chalobah, Bell and Billy as they are the 3 most injury prone.  I said it before the game.  Why change 10 and leave Billy in there.  Poor managerial decision for me.

Sounds like Billy was going to be left out, and then Burke got injured.

I live 150+ miles from London and I didn’t go to the game last night. However, even if I was still living in the South East, I still wouldn’t have gone. The League Cup competition is largely a busted flush now: 12,000 plus of Tottenham’s regular supporters couldn’t  be arsed to go. We have had a good start to the league season and that is where Charlton’s status and future will be decided. Ultimately, it is also where Jones’s reputation will be decided. If someone like Campbell got crocked playing in such a game it would be detrimental to us further cementing our place, or better, in the Championship.

I was as disappointed as everyone when I saw the line-up, not least because I had to pay £15 to watch it even though I have my sub to Charlton TV, because...yeah well I'll come back to that.

After I saw Koumetio was down as well as Sichenje I stopped watching. Very rarely I do that. Actually I think it was when the worst commentator in the world told me that Mesik is Croatian.

But having heard NJ this morning I  I fully get where he's coming from. There's an answer now to why he even played Koumetio. It was because Burke pulled up injured- yet again - in the preparation. Heaven knows why - yet again - Sichenje pulls up with what looks like a bad injury, yet to general surprise goes back on the pitch. That's an issue for the club, certainly, but everything else comes down to the way football has been monetized in this country to ensure that nearly all the money goes to the Premier League. 

Name me another league in Europe which has not one but two major cups.  I'll wait. And while you're doing that, name me another league in Europe whose professional pyramid has as many as 92 clubs.  What's the result? The result is that we're now playing three games a week for several weeks until we all stagger to an extended international break, when fans will have no football whatsoever for 3 weeks, in the middle of autumn. This fucking Carabao Cup has a European place for the winners. Heaven knows why UEFA still allow this, but anyway, you can be absolutely sure that the winner will be yet another Premier League club.  Of course it will. As Louis and Rich calculated on last night's pod, we've got a transfer value of about £10 million inr our squad. Spurs have spent £360 million this window. They could have fielded a 3rd-choice player in virtually every position last night and still matched us for overall quality. NJ's job - which he will stand or fall on - is to get us a decent finish in the championship this season, even though our squad value is low, even within this league.

The Carabao fucking cup actively gets in the way of that goal. It would have been nice to have a real go at Spurs, sure, but at what cost? Well, now you can see the cost. Losing Sichenje alone, we could have coped with, as he had not yet established himself. Koumetio though is one of the outstanding performers so far, and is also now out for an extended period.He was not even supposed to be playing. It means almost certainly, we will have to divert our limited remaining transfer funds from the pursuit of JRS to plugging that huge hole in the centre of our defence. Because we are not Spurs. We are not even Southampton with their parachute money or Stoke with their gambling industry money.

We are all pissed off but let's not forget the real problem which is at the root of it all. There's too much football in England, and nearly all the profit from it flows to and stays within the Premier League clubs. Oh and to pay for the eye watering salaries of the second-rate apparatchiks who call themselves CEOs or as administrators of the game claim they have to be paid like CEOs in order to be able to effectively sit down across the table with the club CEOs. They can all fuck off. Especially the idiots who signed off on the TV deals which mean we can't watch Charlton TV for cup games and instead have to pay extra to listen to one of the worst commentaries I've ever heard. 

Thank you for your attention. Rant over.

Not much point adding anything as it’s all been said but Tottenham (the area) does not deserve that stadium. The stadium deserves a better fan base, absolute silence for most of the game. I’d actually forgotten how much of a toilet Tottenham is, won’t be in a rush to return.