Charlton Athletic 0 Burnley 1

“Our supporters have been terrific and in some ways we don’t deserve it because of how bad we have been. This is a crucial week coming up for us with trips to Peterborough and Huddersfield and we need to pick up something from those games.”

I’ve tried to remain positive about our Valley form albeit from afar but, bloody hell that was poor yesterday wasn’t it?

I mean the effort was unquestionable but the quality was so lacking I hardly clapped a pass or a passage of play. I just sat with 20,064 others, the majority of whom must have spent the entire game in the toilets, which was probably the best seat in fairness, and just wished I’d stayed in the pub.

Powell started with three strikers but they each spent the first hour getting in each others way on the off chance that they may get a pass into feet from one of their team mates behind them and it wasn’t until Powell finally gave the side some width that we actually started to create something. Green in particular impressing me and Harriott raising the temperature a couple of times but not seeing enough of the ball.

Up until then we were relying on Wilson and Wiggins to provide any form of width and whilst Wilson tried his best to get into advanced areas, Wiggins still lacked the fitness to gallop regularly into the acre of space in front of him.

The midfield three was wholly uninspiring, although Pritchard worked hard as usual, Jackson tried desperately to find the right pass, but unsuccessfully whereas Dervite couldn’t put a foot right reminding us, if he needed to, that he is a centre-half and not a cultured centre-midfielder.

Burnley weren’t much better, which made the result all the worse, but each team in this division has a player who can do something special (I’m unsure to who ours is today) but the Clarets had Charlie Austin, who scored one of those goals for the visitors that if I was that way inclined, I would have clapped.

The last 15 minutes was of a particular disappointment to me because at every opportunity we just hoofed the ball into the box with seemingly no idea but to hope for a flukey knock down or a scramble. Don’t get me wrong if we’d scored a goal off someone’s arse I would have celebrated like we’d won the Champions League, but it would have papered over another very disappointing performance.

Our Valley form is little less than scandalous, and somehow needs to be addressed with the players that Powell has available to him. Yet our focus is now on two away games. I’m not going to lie, I’m a little worried.

Addick Bloggers at The Valley: Drinking During the Game; And Nothing Else Matters; Kings Hill Addick; Deepest Darkest; Stickleback; Hungry Ted; Blackheath Addick.
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Elsewhere: Leeds beat Millwall in the early game, leaders Cardiff lost at Middlesbrough, Kieron Dyer scoring a league for the first time in 6 years. Leicester lost at Ipswich but Hull put 5 past Birmingham with George Boyd starring. Brighton beat Huddersfield 4-1, Bolton won at Barnsley 3-2 and Forest were impressive again winning at Sheffield Wednesday. Blackpool and Bristol City was goalless and Blackburn were beaten by Peterborough at Ewood 3-2, after being 3-up at half-time.