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| Saturday, 13-Aug-2005 00:00 |
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Sunderland 1 Charlton 3 - a great start!
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Bent's breakaway strike
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The first time that Charlton have won their opening Premiership fixture for five years and only the second in our seven premiership seasons.
Having trailed to Bolton and back for the humiliating 1-4 defeat at the start of last season I was pretty relieved at today's result. Maybe this is the start that we should have had last year if Curbs had bedded down the new arrivals in time. On the Match of the Day highlights Bent looked like the striker we've been praying for since the days of Hunt and Mendonca. His second goal at the end of the match was the sort of opportunist breakaway strike that we don't seem to have seen for years.
It doesn't mean much, but it's nice to see the Premiership table with us at the top! The only disappointment was Ambrose's dismissal for a rash and unnecessary tackle
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| Saturday, 6-Aug-2005 00:00 |
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A bunch of Wankas
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A bunch of Wankas
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Charming and friendly AEK visitors
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Watching the 2nd Test - 17 wickets in the day!
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That's the end of the pre-season and, on the face of it, a disappointing 1-3 defeat by a beatable AEK Athens team.
Expectations were high after a solid win in mid-week over Feyenoord, There were only two changes in starting line up, with Sorondo and Jeffers replacing Powell and Hughes, but Curbs started with 4-4-2 for a change.
Still, what are pre-season friendlies for? - to check player's match fitness, see how they work together, play with different tactics and formations and that sort of thing. Is the result important? Not really. The grumpy supporter leaving the Lower West complaining that 'that was a ******* disgrace' had surely missed the point.
Still, perhaps the Rose of Denmark regulars had had a premonition of the possible result when they decided to give the first outing to their Deportivo Wanka shirts. DW is a lower division team in Peru, and once we realised that their replica shirts were on sale in the UK we swooped on the remaining stock 
We met some charming and friendly AEK supporters at half time. Although there can't have been very many of them they'd supported their team with very vocal support throughout.
Right, pre-season over - let's get the Premiership campaign underway!
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| Thursday, 23-Jun-2005 00:00 |
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Flowers for Kath
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Unfortunately Kath, the landlady of the Rose of Denmark, has been unwell, so the RoDsters thought that they should express their sympathy and best wishes with some flowers. The bouquet includes Stock, Lilies and Paeonies and smells gorgeous.
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| Sunday, 12-Jun-2005 00:00 |
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Official Supporters Centenary Party
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Even the girl band didn't exactly set things alight
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Headlong beat off the groupies between sets ;o)
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The official Charlton Supporters Centenary Party was held in the car park at The Valley, and the weather wasn't kind, leading to rather a thin attendance. There were the usual Bouncy Castle attractions for the kids, and live music for the adults. 'Headlong' played a good set that had the neighbours complaining about the noise. Just think - if the even had been held as planned in Eastmoor Street there'd have been a nice bit of greenery to laze in and no neighbours to complain  '3 Blokes from F Block' and Headlong wound up the afternoon, with a rather poor girl group sandwiched between them, as it were.
A big 'Wasted Opportunity' for Charlton, IMO. This could have been a memorable centenary, but the club seemed to take little interest in it, apart from launching an awful centenary version of its current shirt and badgering supporters to fully fund the Sam Bartram statue. Whilst not advocating another concert like The Who concert in the 70s it must surely have been possible to have come up with a line-up that would both have attracted the fans and been self-financing. Together with stadium tours, 'meet the players' opportunities and similar attractions this could have been a fantastic celebration, instead of descending into childish bickering and recriminations.
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| Saturday, 11-Jun-2005 00:00 |
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Supporters' Centenary 'Haddock & Chips Party'
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George Savin, aged 1
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George eyes the celebration cake
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Kay Mercer, daughter of an early club sponsor, cuts the cake
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Charlton Athletic was founded on 9th June 1905, and on the nearest Saturday to the 100th anniversary Charlton Supporters held a Haddock & Chips celebration. It started in Eastmoor Street (formerly East Street) where the inaugural meeting had been held, and continued in the Rose of Denmark of Woolwich Road.
Former players Graham Tutt, Brian Kinsey and Albert Uytenbogaardt joined us, as did members of the founding families of the club. It's a shame that 'office politics' prevented people associated with the club today from feeling they could join in too and that they could only be seen at the 'official event' held the following day.
In the event, the weather was excellent on the Saturday. However, it was heavily overcast and chilly on the Sunday, which must have depressed turnout significantly.
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| Thursday, 9-Jun-2005 00:00 |
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Centenary at Charlton
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I went down for the 3pm unveiling of Sam's statue and was pleasantly surprised at the number of supporters who'd turned out, many wearing colours. It was a surprisingly moving event, considering that Bartram's been dead for so long, and away from The Valley for even longer.
Derek Upfton spoke movingly and fluently about Bartram from personal experience. Sam's daughter was close to tears as she spoke very briefly. All very fitting. I now think I may have understood the man a little better.
What I didn't understand when I went there later was all of the scare-mongering about the safety of Eastmoor Street for the aborted Supporters Celebrations. As the photos below clearly show, there is a complete absence of burned out wrecked cars and only minimal rubbish, all of which would have been cleared in minutes as planned. This would have been a fine site for the centenary celebrations, and preferable to the CAFC car park, which itself isn't free of rubbish.
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| Sunday, 15-May-2005 00:00 |
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The end of a disappointing season
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CAFC 2 Crystal Palace 2
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At least the ground looked good!
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Cheerful in spite of the poor season!
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2004/05 was a season that started disappointingly and thereafter never really got going. We had a good December, followed by some FA Cup excitement before losing to Leicester and then seeing a truly awful Premiership finish, with only six points from ten games - the worst record in the Premiership this season. Still we stayed up without ever really feeling the cold draught of relegation worries, which is something.
Palace would have survived in the Premiership if only Jon Fortune hadn't atoned for his defensive errors by heading home Jerome Thomas' excellent cross, and thus levelled the score. Still, it's unusual for any club to get promoted after a spell in the Championship and stay up in the first season.
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| Friday, 13-May-2005 00:00 |
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Members of the Opposition 2004/05
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2004/05 - 1 match to go
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I've pretty much finished this season's composite MOTO picture. All I have to do is add Sunday's photo and the score.
In the previous two seasons it's been fairly simple to fit in 19 photos, plus one extra to give a four rows of five formation. This year I've had a more difficult job, with three FA Cup games to squeeze in. There were actually two photos at the Leicester game - a total of 23.
Several times this season we've met up again with visiting supporters who have been in previous photos, so obviously the idea is catching on!
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| Sunday, 1-May-2005 00:00 |
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Next season's struggle starts here
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Only six weeks ago we beat Spurs in style and were convinced that we could improve on the traditional, miserable end of season slump. With ten games to go we had forty points, and even if we claimed only half the remaining points we'd improve on our best ever Premiership total.
We always knew that the three final fixtures would be tough; ManU at home, Chelsea away and Palace at home, and I thought we'd do well to get two points from those games, so it was important to do well in the preceding seven matches. In the end, those games gave us only five points. This scotches the theory that we're 'over-performing', as it dumps us amongst the Blackburns and Birminghams.
There was very little self-belief on show as Charlton took on an off-colour ManU. If we were ever to end the run of never having beaten them in the Premiership today was the ideal day to take the opportunity to see if it would ever be possible. And for half an hour we looked OK, with the crowd in good heart. When the first goal went in that all evaporated and the juggernaut rolled over a dispirited Charlton, and we conceded four goals for the EIGHTH time this season.
It was interesting to hear the ManU supporters chanting, 'Rio, Rio, sign the deal', and 'Chelsea Rent Boy' at Ferdinand. It would hardly have impressed someone who rarely seems to make decisions for himself and who's not exactly known for his mental agility. It was also richly ironic to hear chants like that from supporters whose club has spent freely on transfers itself - how much did they spend on Rio alone?
Still, it was a sunny afternoon, and there was the usual convivial atmosphere in the Rose of Denmark. There was a HUGE ManU presence, very few of whom were wearing colours of any sort. Mind you, a couple of the locals were wearing the colours of Peruvian club Deportivo Wanka  )
There was also a contingent of Canadian Addicks, led by Bob Miller from Hamilton, Ontario, whom could surely had picked a better game if they wanted to see Charlton picking up some points!
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| Saturday, 16-Apr-2005 00:00 |
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We're getting used to this
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Charlton 1 Bolton 2
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When Charlton get into their end-of-season rut it makes you wonder how on earth we managed to get into the top half of the table, let alone reach safety from relegation. We've now picked up only four points from the last fifteen, which is entirely in line with all of our previous Premiership seasons, so we shouldn't be surprised.
Yesterday's performance was better than the last three I've watched (West Brom and City at home, and Portsmouth away), but comparisons with the exhilarating win against Spurs last month are hard to avoid. The loss for three games of El Karkouri has been an important factor, but you'd expect a Premiership squad to be able to weather that.
Our last Saturday home fixture this season gave us the chance to mingle with some excellent Bolton supporters, who gave us some interesting insights into their team, e.g. that Bolton also suffer from the Charlton affliction of pulling everyone back for corners and leave no-one upfield to occupy the opposition and be the focus for a quick break from defence. One good thing to emerge from Saturday is that both clubs will be meeting next season, so we'll have the chance to meet up again.
Five fixtures to go: ManU and Palace at home, and Villa, Norwich and Chelsea away. Unless Curbs conjures up a miracle we'll see as few points from these as we gained from the last five.
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