Charlton Athletic 2 Bolton Wanderers 1

As the final whistle to games from Porto to Port Vale to Portsmouth all blew way before us, the Addicks clung onto 3 valuable points tonight bouncing back from Saturday’s first defeat of the season.

Tonight’s game had a red flag written all over it following the inept performance at Bournemouth and Neil Lennon bringing his new manager bounce to The Valley, the home of “perennial strugglers” as Lennon described us. Incentive enough for Bob and his depleted squad.

One look at the Charlton bench was evidence enough of what slim pickings Bob has to deal with but I was pleased that George Țucudean was finally given another opportunity and he grabbed it finishing superbly from a neat Buyens ball and then setting up the skipper, Johnnie Jackson to fire home a second.

It wouldn’t be Charlton if a comfortable position didn’t last longer than five minutes and Moxey pulled one back for the Trotters and then it was another backs to the wall effort with us losing out not for the first time on possession and chances but winning the only statistic that matters.

I would put this down as a very important win. The timing is good and after Saturday Bob and his players were faced with a new challenge and they met it.

George was getting some stick, but we need to back him and hope he can excel especially if Igor is going to miss some games. He did everything you could ask tonight.

A better team may have beaten us, yet we have beaten better teams. Buyens was booked and will miss Friday, so Bob will be hunting around the development squad for another body tomorrow.

Come on you reds.

Addick Bloggers at The Valley:

Around the League: Bournemouth rolled over Reading 3-0 to notch another good win, Wolves beat Middlesbrough 2-0, Blackburn beat managerless Birmingham and Derby top the table after winning late at Blackpool. Rotherham and Fulham shared 6 goals and Watford and Forest drew 2-2 in the top of the table clash.