Charlton Athletic 1 Preston North End 2

Apologies for another delay on my post match thoughts. I was at The Valley again yesterday and again had to drown my sorrows afterwards.

This morning I woke with my stomach churning and that was not due to the late night Brick Lane curry.

I will put it out there. I am nervous now. I was never one that thought this season was cut and dried, I was still habitually looking behind us and not above us, yet it is still in our hands but we need to take this season by the scruff of the neck. Soon.

Again, I thought we played okay yesterday, pretty well in parts, but we are locked in a pattern of errors and bad judgement calls, especially at home.

Team news was that Clarke missed out due to injury and Fevrier played in his place. JRC also started instead of concussion protocolled Coady. Leaburn, Godden, Kelman, Berry and Fullah were all on the bench.

The start to the game yesterday was enthralling. Docherty had a fierce volley just over in the opening minute closely followed by a Mannion saved and then JRC hit the post. The Valley was up but the game was very open.

Carey had a shot blocked and TC had one saved before a long throw from Carey found JRC via a Preston head, and he fired home. 18 minutes on the clock and we had a dream start.

We were on the front foot, and the Covered End was enjoying itself until Jones got himself in a muddle and gave away a throw. From that a cross was headed in by Dobbin and suddenly were back level. Jones went down for a period later in that half, he continued but I felt he was less assured yesterday.

That Preston goal switched the momentum, and the visitors cheered on by a sea of bowler hats, finished the half the stronger.

The beginning of the 2nd half did not mirror the first and we were sluggish, unable to string any positive moves together and Jones surprisingly replaced JRC with Fullah and less surprisingly Godden was introduced for Chambers. Immediately I noticed a far better connectivity between Dykes and Godden, who has to start next week.

However an error from Fullah saw Preston break quickly, something we never do, and Potts finished within seconds of the turnover in our own half.

Once again we found ourselves behind at home and having to chase the game.

For 15 minutes we threw the kitchen sink at them, and in fairness to PNE, they defended like a promotion place depended on it.

Godden was buzzing everywhere, Dykes was throwing himself at everything, Carey was getting shots off, crosses were coming in from Fevrier and TC but we couldn’t get the point that would still have been very valuable.

Deep in injury time Dykes came the closest with a goalbound close range shot that was remarkably blocked by a defender.

No knocking the effort, and Jones and the players were clapped off, but we badly need to find some quality that will finally prove that we deserve to be here.

🎙️“We only had to put enough quality into the box in the last 15 minutes because we had so many bodies in there, plus size and movement. But we didn’t. We either hit it too hard or we had three set-plays right at the end where we hit the near post twice and then we clipped it to the edge of the box, which could have cost us. We didn’t have enough quality in the final third. Is that decisions or personnel? We need to be better.” – Nathan Jones

⭐️ Greg Docherty

🏟️ 18,902 (2,101 from Preston)

📸 Paul Edwards