Stalemate at The Valley

Charlton Athletic 1 - Oldham Athletic 1.

Not a game for the purists yesterday at The Valley. 

Ultimately, Oldham gave a much better account of themselves than last season.

They came to play rather than stifle. The result was the same as last season but whereas last season I left the game feeling annoyed with Oldham, this time I felt I owed them respect.

The game had 2 well taken goals, a fussy referee who thought we'd come to see him, a poor crowd (in numbers), a number of let offs for the Addicks that on another day could have seen us losing by 2 or 3 goals and a dramatic ending to the game where it looked like it was all going to kick off with a baseball style bench emptying ruck.

On balance, Oldham were good value for their point.

Charlton weren't bad, the team just didn't 'click' properly.

There are many more games for everything to come together properly.

A Casual Rating

I particularly enjoyed Waggy's second goal in a week but I was really impressed by Furman's equaliser and the general play ofTounkara.

Much as everybody pretends that 'we don't want to see this kind of thing', I think we all enjoyed the antics at the end of the game when Jarrett completely lost his cool after being shown a second yellow card.

I'm awarding the Lacoste polo to Robbie Elliott for his 3, possibly 4 point saving saves, though his woodwork was equally helpful.

The Primark novelty slogan tee shirt is going to the bloke who sat next to me.

Have a wash mate.

You stunk beyond belief and it turned my stomach everytime you waved at the referee to share your opinions.

A clean tee shirt is most certainly the order of the day.