Hail the fallen and departed

Looking back at the 1st team listing in last seasons opening fixture Valley review against Man U, of the players listed, the surprise is that 16 remain. Of the 18 that left one player exceeded all others by leaving before he joined - Christian Bolanos, now plying his trade in Denmark, soon to be followed by Jason Euell, who was the first to leave, going to Middlesboro. Boro could be the team that picked up our first and last departure. In between we lost two Uruguayans, a clutch of hopefuls Myles Weston for instance and some worthy contributors to the cause and a couple of wasters - JFH and Romm come to mind.

If Ralph Milne was Lennies folly, then Romm was probably Curbs's, although none of us saw it at the time and JFH Dowies. Les Reeds' was, of course, saying yes.

Of all the players we have had at the Valley has any disappointed more than Romm. We all slagged Lisbie , some of us ancients felt the same about the man that scored our winner at Old Trafford - I was there - Mark Stuart, maybe Murphy - but he had his moments and then there were the failures: Kenny Achampong comes to mind as well. But Romm, he came with such expectation and potential and he never realised it, maybe it was English football, no one else wanted him, maybe it was the way we played. Its interesting that we were interested in another player from PSV Mathias Kezman, who had formed a lethal partnership with Romm in Holland and he too failed over here. So if we ever run a poll for most disappointing player in a Charlton shirt then my vote goes to a player I admired and hoped for, for so long, Dennis Rommedahl.

As for the other players that left, my top three in no particular order:

Luke Young, who heated up after some luke warm performances and became a worthy wearer of the Captains arm band.
Jason Euell, whose legacy at the Valley will be marred by his last couple of seasons, but no one should forget the performances he put in and that he was our leading scorer for two or three seasons.
Tala El Kakouri, short of wearing a Fez, I could not have been entertained any more by him, in seconds he would go from world class to school class as a defender and his three free kick goals were awesome, unfortunately there were another 10 between each goal that sailed over the stand and it was not always over the stand behind the goal.

We have a new batch of players, but still a strong core from last season, weeks now seperate us from seeing the true strength of our squad, maybe one or two more additions - the loans and the late comers - it is difficult to imagine any further departures, with the exception of maybe Marcus and Thomas and maybe some more loans out. This time next year we could be reviewing the new players that will take us into a new premiership season or looking back at where it all went wrong and the folly of buying him and him etc,.