Stewart moves to Leeds

I think Roland Duchatelet’s takeover came a little too late to prevent Chris Powell changing Cameron Stewart’s mind.

Leeds were in for him in while back and today he finally signed for them on loan until the end of the season, with the lure of a 3-year contract at the end of it when his Hull contract expires. A promotion battle over a relegation one and the security of a three and a half deal I am sure swung it for the Manchester born winger.

I liked Stewart, he was direct, could take a player on and scored a couple of great goals. It does give Harriott a chance to re-establish himself, but I think that leaves quite a big hole in our already thin squad.

Apart from the early loan signing of Astrit Ajdarevic, and rumours of Liege goalkeeper Yohann Thuram appearing in SE7 to compete with Hamer, Alnwick and Pope, it is very quiet on the incoming front.

More importantly I would think is for Powell to get approval from Duchatelet to offer some new contracts to those that expire in June. I would expect that most of CP’s energy is now going into convincing the players that he wants to stay that there is a future at the club under new ownership. It would help Chris do this if he had some kind of guarantees himself.

One of those players is Dale Stephens, said to be subject of a bid of £1m from Stoke City. This has been Stephens best season but throughout this month the club will be forced to play a game of chance as agents haul around lists of players to other managers and chairman, that will include 17 Charlton players out of contract in the summer. Some may wait, some may test our resolve on players such as Stephens, Wiggins, Kermorgant and Morrison or some may tempt with a pre-contractual agreement.

What has become apparent is that we are not going to see a hurricane force fanfare from Duchatelet. It is said that he is back in Belgium working on his plan for the Addicks and will in time meet further with Richard Murray and Chris Powell to discuss his goals and objectives.

Duchatelet hasn’t bought the club to watch us get relegated, so I do hope he has given Powell and Murray an outline of a transfer kitty for January, and not just a list of Standard Liege’s reserves.