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Sep 30

Double edged Blade

10 league games unbeaten then and as Addicks’ fans wait for the fall it is interesting to see that in quite a few of those games we have come pretty close to losing, none more so than on Tuesday night in Bletchley.

Against MK, Rochdale, Sheffield Wednesday and Bury we were under threat, but the players came through the challenge. Depending on your state of mind that proves that we are either fortunate or brave. Despite years of mental torture I like to err on the side of optimism and suggest that Powell has instilled some long lost backbone and spirit in the side and although having not watched live 8 of those 10 games I get the impression from fellow fans and the crowd encouragement as heard on the radio there is a lot more belief doing the rounds.
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Sep 27

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MK Dons 1 Charlton Athletic 1

Great point tonight after a first half when we were clearly second-best. The 2nd half was much improved though and listening on the radio as the game moved past the hour mark I was urging Powell to change it, but to be fair we were well on top at that stage. Then he introduced Green first and then Kermorgant and both combined to grab a peach (by the sounds of it) equaliser.

After that the game swayed from one end to the other with both sides having chances to win the 3 points, and although I was disappointed to hear Powell settle for a point by bringing on Hughes for BWP, I will happily take the point.
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Sep 26

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Travelogue: Magaluf, Mallorca

A few people asked me why we picked Magaluf as a venue for a boys weekend, the fact is that it picked itself. It was in Magaluf that 25-years ago me and 12 of my closest mates had our first ever foreign holiday. Most of us are still in touch and we were all at secondary school together albeit spread over three different years. In fact one of the lads I went to nursery school with (42 years ago) and he still harangues me about never letting him have a go on the plastic tricycle!

We travelled in style. Six of us in my mate´s London cab to Stansted (where we met the rest of our group), Easy Jet to Palma for around 100 quid, and then our own mini-bus to the 3 star hotel that we´d booked bang in the middle of it all and next door to the monstrous BCM nightclub, which unsurprisingly smelt like a cocktail of puke, Red Bull and bleach. Despite the fact the Island’s largest nightclub was next door, our hotel was pretty quiet save for the obligatory banging on doors in the middle of the night and loud British voices.
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Sep 25

Charlton Athletic 3 Chesterfield 1

Yesterday was a long day and I won’t bore you with the details but some of our obstacles included hangovers, a driver that was one late, and two incompetent, the TSA, our daughter who was naughtier yesterday than on any other day since she popped into our life and lost work permits.

The shining light was Charlton, who rose to the occasion yesterday afternoon at a packed Valley.
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Sep 23

Changing colours

A family orientated week in Chicago accompanied by early nights and late mornings. September is a beautiful time to be in Chicago. Liberated from any humidity, walking the cities convivial streets is an absolute pleasure. The leaves on the trees might be changing colour but the locals are hanging on to every thread of summer despite the pumpkins, witches and skeletons rapidly appearing in readiness for the wintery Halloween celebrations in 6 week time.

Tonight we have our one night out of the week when we have collected together six of our best friends for a dinner at Prasino in Wicker Park, a neighbourhood a short cab ride away.
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Sep 22

Brad luck

Bradley Pritchard has fractured the fifth metatarsal on his right foot, and will miss ‘a number of weeks’ according to Chris Powell (more)

That’s a real shame for the 25-year old who has impressed fans this season after coming in from the Conference side Hayes & Yeading in the summer. What that does do is open up a space on the bench for someone else and a bit more of what I call a game-changer. Danny Green could be fit or perhaps Bover Izquierdo might get the nod. After playing in a reserve friendly victory over a West Ham XI on Tuesday I have a sneaky suspicion that Powell might be tempted with Kermorgant on the bench as well?
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Sep 19

The Wedding Party

Saturday we were at a great wedding here in Chicago, and what we’ve talked about a lot since was how after pre-dinner drinks we were led into a huge decked out ballroom expecting to sit and eat but instead were met by a 12 piece band and the beginnings of a massive party as everyone hit the dance floor and dinner was put back an hour or so. Then during each course there was another 20 minutes or so of partying with speeches thrown in intermittently.
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Sep 18

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Rochdale 2 Charlton Athletic 3

It was another excellent away win at Spotland yesterday for the Addicks and for almost the entirety of the match I was at a children’s park on Chicago’s north shore frantically checking my phone for updates whilst with my daughter and my mate and his two young kids.

Why I was pushing the swing seeking some kind of respite from the Twitter updates I was thinking how after all these years the elation and the despair doesn’t ever seem to recede as we raced into a two-goal lead at half-time, only for Dale to peg us back to all square, before Danny Hollands headed in the winner from a Johnnie Jackson corner. Is that the first goal we have scored from a corner this season? Is it even the first attempt on goal from a corner this season?
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Sep 17

Leaving Las Vegas

Three prophesied days of fun and frolics in Las Vegas then. Eating, drinking, gambling, a Cirque du Soleil show, shopping and I even managed to throw in a work’s conference as well. The next stop is Chicago, a city that I hold very dear in my heart.

I do like Vegas and if you have never been, it really is somewhere that should appear on your bucket list. A few nights is enough though, for me anyway, because sleeping doesn’t appear high up on the list of things to do and my candle is severely charred at both ends!
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Sep 14

In spirit if not body

My body doesn’t like me too much at the moment. After a weekend on the toot in Magaluf pretending to be 25-years younger than I really am, I then flew myself 9 hours back in time to Sin City, Las Vegas which included a sprint through Heathrow’s new Terminal 5 to make my final connection.

When my alarm went off on Monday night when I was in a cab taking me from the airport in Las Vegas to the hotel, it signalled that I had been up for 24 hours.
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Sep 14

Charlton Athletic 0 Preston North End 2

A first defeat of the season but there will be very few tears shed amongst Addicks’ fans last night especially when League One results elsewhere conspired to take us to the top of the table.

From early reports it sounded as if our 2nd XI disappointed last night after the furore of the Reading game. Now this could be one of two things, the main one for me being the lack of match practice for our reserve players. The Reading game came on the back of a stimulating pre-season remember and a couple of behind the scene friendlies is not going to cut it and this concerned me.

Secondly by the looks of it, Preston put out a very strong team and without knowing I would hazard a guess that the Lancastrians were much more physical than a Reading team who came to pass the ball.
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Sep 12

Charlton Athletic 2 Exeter City 0

The two-man Addick contingent in our party followed proceedings in a Magaluf bar on Saturday afternoon courtesy of Soccer Saturday and Twitter. It sounded like we made a little hard work of the victory but playing against ten men and probably a referee intent on levelling things up after an obvious balls-up (photo) is never easy.
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Sep 12

Trains, planes and automobiles

Well we made it through. The 25-year Magaluf reunion was a real laugh although it might take my sense of smell a while to lose the constant odour of puke, which Magaluf gratefully bestows!

There were two very late nights, each followed by an unfamiliar early afternoon wake up, sandwiched between two nights of two hours sleep each. Last night my room mate beating me to a deep sleep for the first time this weekend so I had to listen to his cacophonous snoring. Once I piece it all together I’ll write more on our weekend amongst the teenagers and geriatrics that mingle, mostly in a very northern accent, in this little corner of Majorca.

Because I try to make my life as complicated as possible, this trip doesn’t stop there. The Magaluf weekend had been in the diary for long time and so had a friends wedding in Chicago next Saturday. All fine so far. I had even pencilled in a little trip to Milton Keynes tomorrow night after the fixtures came out in the summer.

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Sep 11

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10 years ago today….

I was walking back from lunch with a client just by the steps to the Lloyds Building in the city when we heard a few whispers that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center in New York City. The whispers got more frantic and we walked into a nearby office and watched the tragic drama unfold on a television.

My client had a sister in New York and was desperate for news of her, while I thought about my colleagues that occupied 8 of the top floors in the No. 2 South Tower. 176 of whom sadly lost their lives, 2,606 altogether at the WTC site and 2,977 in total not including the 19 cowardly hijackers.

That terrible day still doesn’t seem real, it was so horrific that even the most creative of film writer hadn’t thought of a plot so deplorable.
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Sep 7

Road to Brazil

Whilst England and the rest of Europe are still concentrating on qualifying for the European Championships in Poland and the Ukraine, elsewhere around the globe countries have already started the long, long journey to Brazil 2014.

Qualifying matches have already started in Asia and the North, Central American and Caribbean region and last night in Guyana at the countries national stadium (mostly used for cricket) Bermuda were playing in a Round 2 Group B match.
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Sep 6

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Air miles

With the announcement that Air Miles is rebranding to Avios I have decided to beat the record of combining the most flights and beers into a single week.

Overnight tonight I fly to Gatwick, and in the morning after a super strong cup of Costa Coffee I will drive down to my parents in the East Sussex countryside for a little breakfast. Then I get back in the motor and will rush back to Maidstone to have a look around my son’s new school, Oakwood Park, and then take him out to dinner.

Thursday is the lull before the storm, when I plan to catch up with a few people and some zzzz’s.
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Sep 6

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Charlton Athletic 1 Sheffield Wednesday 1

Disappointing last night especially after such as wonderful start (which I missed).

After the 15th minute I managed to watch the game on a decent internet feed and for the rest of the half we were on top and trying to get the ball down at every opportunity.

In the 2nd half Wednesday, with Semedo pivotal, won the midfield battle and it was frustrating to watch us too often rely on the long ball down the big throats of the Wednesday backs. Hamer I thought also was culpable sending every goal kick long and refusing to send willing full backs away with an early throw. And whilst on the subject of throws. Please, enough of the ‘Stoke long throw game.’ Yes, use it as one of our weapons but not from every blimmin’ throw-in!

Whilst our back four were rarely troubled as soon as I saw Clinton bloody Morrison on the touchline, those of us with long memories would have feared the worse and sure enough the concerns were soon realised as again we conceded from a set-piece.
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Sep 5

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Oakwood Park Grammar School

My son starts his new school today and he is the only one not nervous. After pleasantly surprising us all (he was perfect borderline) and flying through his 11+ a year ago, and living in Kent, he was fortunate to have a choice of Grammar Schools to choose from.

Our first choice was Maidstone Grammar but this was always a long shot due to distance and also his grades came up a tad short. Second choice, which we and most importantly my son were all happy about was Oakwood Park, and sure enough that is where he got accepted.
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Sep 3

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Today in League One

With Charlton playing on Monday we couldn’t rely on either Franchise or the Blades dropping any points this afternoon and in fact they both won at ease. MK up at Carlisle 3-1 with Charlie MacDonald scoring again and Sheffield United thrashing Ryan Lowe-less Bury 4-0.
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Sep 1

Deadline deals

So we only added one new player to the 17 we had already signed. I lay in bed last night counting new signings and not sheep as I tried to get to sleep. Go on, try it tonight and try to picture them as well. It’s not easy.

Apart from Neil Warnock, Tony Pulis and Arsene Wenger, I’ve been looking around our division to see who else was busy on transfer deadline day.

Late last night Sheffield United agreed to sell exciting striker Jordan Slew to Blackburn for £1m and Daniel Bogdanovic went to Blackpool for an undisclosed fee. They did manage to keep Stephen Quinn but the Blades approach this weekend’s game with Bury not knowing if the paperwork was done in time for the incoming loans of Rangers midfield duo Kyle Hutton and John Fleck. Talking of Bury, Ryan Lowe is going to be hard to replace, but the Shakers did sign Northampton’s Shaun Harrod, who has never played above League Two plus they captured midfielders Shane Byrne and Giles Coke on loan from Leicester City and Sheffield Wednesday respectively.
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