End of the Year Show.

Leyton Orient 1 - Charlton Athletic 0.



The turning point this evening was most certainly the sending off of Ben Hamer.
Orient are a decent mid table side but no great shakes. Had Charlton managed to keep 11 players on the pitch, I doubt if the O's would have gained more than a point - though they deserved their win.

From my view, admittedly maybe a little fuzzy due to a Jack Daniels haze, the sending off seemed very harsh.
I thought the ball had hit our keeper somewhere between the chest and armpit but the referee seemed to be very sure Hamer had handled it and the rules say he had to go.

Charlton then had to play 85 minutes, plus stoppage time, with only ten men.
Waggy was withdrawn and Sullivan came on between the sticks.

Sullivan was most unfortunate to concede when Orient scored.
(Ex CAFC) Spring hit a ball that was unlikely to trouble the goal until it deflected off Taylor and ended up turning into the most perfect dipping shot.

From that moment on, a combination of solid Orient defending and fairly homerish officiating meant Charlton were heading for only the second defeat of the season.
Having said that, Orient had the ball in the net again but the linesman had his flag up for offside. It looked extremely tight from our angle.

Charlton really went for it in the final 20 minutes and could have scored two or three.
Orient kept one off the line that already had most of us celebrating but it wasn't to be.
2000 of us roared the team on towards what we hoped would be a big finish but the ball just wouldn't go in.

It is a shame the final game of the year was ruined by a sending off so early on but I can't say our team didn't give their best.

To have reached the New Year and only lose twice is remarkable, especially as both of the reversals were 1-0 away defeats due to savage deflections.

I can't help feeling positive about our chances for promotion in 2012.
Well done Leyton Orient tonight but come May, hopefully it'll be the mighty Addicks who'll be celebrating.

One final thing to say is a big thanks to all the people who have taken the time to read my notes on here. Other than a few Oldham and Tranmere supporters most of the comments have been fair, even if people haven't agreed with me.

A healthy and prosperous New Year to everybody, Charlton supporters or otherwise.

Live, Love, Laugh and be Happy.

In a Nutshell.

A brief summary of tonight.

Charlton Athletic 0- Leyton Orient 1.
(The first home defeat since March 2009.)

A poor performance from too many of our players against a team who made up for their limitations by 'wanting it' far more than us.

Charlton had plenty of chances to grab a draw and had everything fallen our way, could have ended up running away easy winners.

It wasn't to be.
Nothing fell the way of Charlton.

Dave Mooney's woeful miss was one of those occasions where you weren't sure if you should shout abuse, laugh or cry at the ineptitude.

 Bailey, Shelvey and Mooney had particularly 'off nights' but in truth, only Richardson could leave the field with his head held high.
Elliot didn't really have much to do and Sam always looked to be a threat but our team looked as if they were all playing in ill fitting boots.

Llera was so bad, he surely won't be holding onto his place when Sodje becomes available again at the weekend.
For the second game running, he made a feature of miss kicks and slices. His distribution was a choice of a ball pumped forward, Jon Fortune style to no one in particular or an over hit ball straight to the opposition.
He has played far better.

We were lucky to keep the score down to the single goal after Orient also hit the post with Elliot well beaten.

Perhaps it's the kick up the bum the team needs but it's looking like we will have to rely on Leeds and / or Norwich imploding in order to end the season with anything other than a Play Off place.

Let's hope the team are forced to sit through a recording of the game when they arrive at Sparrows Lane tomorrow morning.

There was the first "Boo" of the season from sections of the crowd at the end of the game.

We await the reaction on Saturday against Tranmere.

A Casual Rating
Fraser Richardson can have the Lacoste polo shirt for his surging runs and along with Sam, he continued to look dangerous throughout the game.

The Primark novelty slogan Tee shirt is being awarded to all those who booed at the end of the game.
I also expect Big Mig Llera to be wearing a new tee shirt at training tomorrow for the reasons highlighted above.
Nicky Bailey has been awarded a Primark special for his now expected dive to ground, while holding his face, in the build up to Scott McGleish's goal.
He left a huge gap at the back which lead directly to a lack of cover in the penalty area.

A Taste of the Orient

We welcome Leyton Orient at the Valley tomorrow evening for another game under floodlights and in front of the Sky cameras.

In recent years, our results while being broadcast 'live' have been as patchy as our record in the North West but it is clear we are witnessing an altogether 'different' Charlton this season.

There's likely to be huge banks of empty seats on show for the cameras which will only remind the viewing public how far our stock has fallen.

As far as League 1 crowds go, ours aren't bad at all but when there are 10,000 shiny plastic seats blinking in the lights it looks poor.

I thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Brisbane Road back on one of those warm, sunny, long shadowed evenings.

It was my first game of the season after returning from holiday.

We went behind but then came back to win 2-1, largely due to a moment of sublime skill from Shelvey and an atrocious back header, intercepted by Burton.

The sight of our large and loud away following bouncing around in celebration, and then seeing pockets of our supporters all over the ground doing the same sent me a message that this season might be a little better than the previous two shockers.

We had actually sold out an away allocation and then had groups of people attend on the sly.

We rarely sold out allocations in the bigger stadiums but at this level our support looked impressive.

It's likely that Orient will bring far more supporters than Hartlepool did last week.

I admire people who choose to follow Orient.

It takes a certain kind of character to decide Orient are their team and dismiss the heady local delights of West Ham or any of the other more 'glamorous' London sides.

We are of course playing them at a time when we are unlikely to be picking up many 'new' fans ourselves.

We can at least hark back to recent successes against Arsenal, Chelsea etc etc and kid ourselves that we are experiencing a 'blip' while playing in Tier 3.

What can Orient fans look back at?

My own, (admittedly unresearched), memories of success for Orient go no further than remembering them in the 1978 FA Cup semi final.

Surely there's more?

I salute the Orient fans and I am going to add them to my ever increasing list of 'real football supporters' we are meeting this season.

It's another of those, (ahem), 'MUST WIN' games.

There are lots of points still to play for and there will be many more twists and turns at the top of the league but it would make everyone feel good to keep up with Yorkshire and Norfolk.

.................................Now where did I put my mankini?