Aug 16
The one thing about a sloppy start is there is no covering up the misgivings of a skinny inadequate squad.
In past season’s with a similar anemic pre-season but with a much-less caring owner, we have started well against the odds. At Sunderland a couple of season’s back Lee Bowyer carried a half-filled bench, refusing to sing the ‘pathway to the first-team’ crap and just took the players he felt could come on and make a difference.
Please click for moreI don’t have a lot of like for Birmingham City. I’ve been to St. Andrews numerous times and most of them have been rather unpleasant, off the field anyway. Yet I have been keeping an eye on their progress under Lee Bowyer, and today a win at ‘Wayne Rooney’s Derby’ secured their Championship safety which looked very dubious upon his arrival in mid-March.
A sad day.
Lee Bowyer gave me one of the best days of my life. 90 +4. Wembley Stadium. Me, my son, my brother, my mates, 39,000 joyous fellow Addicks. Thank you Lee.
This time may well be right for everyone, and although I cringed whenever fellow fans were calling for his head, today’s resignation with a move to Birmingham City expected allows everyone to shake hands turn around, and walk away with a big smile on their faces.
Lee Bowyer told his players this morning that he will be leaving the club. It is widely expected that he will take over at Birmingham City, who are looking for a new manager after they sacked Aitor Karanka over the weekend.
Amongst the total hopelessness today was the sound of the death knoll echoing around that famous stadium. We couldn’t hear it, but it was there loud and long.
A month or so back we stopped looking like a promotion team. Today we didn’t look like a team at all, shorn of all pride and commitment.
I am quite a level-headed Addick. There’s thousands of posts below here ⬇️ that would suggest that. What would Curbs say? Don’t over celebrate the wins, nor over scrutinize the losses. Something like that, anyway.
Although it posted on Sunday morning, I did write my post match blog straight after the game against Gillingham. I was frustrated, disheartened and annoyed. Nothing like a good moan in the pub after a defeat with your mates, accept there was no pub, or mates to talk out the sorrow with until you realize there is always next week, and the next pint.
Lee Bowyer touched on a topic many of us have highlighted as a problem today, and that is our miserable home form.
By my calculations under Bowyer at The Valley since he took over with fans in the ground the Addicks won 26 of their 46 league games that were played. That does not include play-off’s, or games this season with a small number of socially distanced fans allowed in.
The number 9 shirt has finally been filled after Preston’s Jayden Stockley signed on loan for the rest of the season.
Stockley made an impression last year at The Valley, but this season has found starting hard at Preston with Tom Barkhuizen, Scott Sinclair and Sean Maguire ahead of him and recently they added Ched Evans as well.
Okay, I’ve counted to 1,000. Something that Lee Bowyer should’ve done last night, but I’m still not really in the mood to write something, but here goes.
There were actually positives. We were certainly more assertive going forward. Millar added some exuberence and with Maatsen may provide a sprightly left side offering. Smyth wants to take people on and is a happy nuisance and we had more shots on goal than we have had collectively for weeks. Ronnie Schwartz made his debut and despite not playing for a very long period wanted to be involved even though the game was up.
Frustrating watching the Addicks at the moment, and I’m thinking I may do something else with my time on Friday afternoon rather than watch the Accrington Stanley game from behind the sofa.
The biggest barrier to watching them at the moment for me is that as a team they are hard to like. What I mean by that is there are no characters, or any sense of leadership. Where’s the midfield terrier, who will chase anything and anyone all around the pitch?
Bloody awful again. Start to finish. Hull so much better than us. No one played well, half of them didn’t seem to know where they were playing and I didn’t sense any type of game-plan.
What the hell has happened since the international break, something is clearly not right. We have just two injuries of any note. Yes, they are key centre-halves, but we have one glued to the bench while Bowyer insists on playing a stream of bizarre cocktails of formations and positions.
The salary cap is an annoyance isn’t it. The first time since our promotion from League One under the spiffs have we got a few bob to spend and we can’t spend it.
January transfer window activity is notoriously hard, even before the current EFL restriction and in the wider context of what the pandemic has brought, but I do foresee Thomas pushing through a fair bit of January turnover.
A quarter of the League One season gone. Seems like years already, probably because it’s hard to remember much of a gap between last season and this one. Having almost two entirely different squads to support helps press the re-set button though.
The first time in 11 seasons that we’ve exited the FA Cup in the 1st Round, and only the second time since 1973, but Lee Bowyer didn’t appear to care much, and he made the point in as many words at least, that if the players had cared more we wouldn’t have lost.
Bow was pretty scathing in his post-match press conference about most things – the players who came back in, bar one or two, the amount of games, the “stupid cup” on Tuesday and the international break. Marcus Maddison was given the benefit of doubt but his expectation of the midfielder’s work rate was left in little doubt.
This one has been on the horizon for a while, and Bowyer and Gallen have finally gotten themselves a right back with Welsh international Chris Gunter signing on a two-year contract with an option of a third.
Gunter has 97 caps and could make that 98 tonight when England host them at Wembley.
Chicago Addick 