It's All About Results!

It is only a few weeks ago that there was a gnashing of teeth (as well as chattering in Woolwich) and a feeling that the Duchatalet regime was destroying our club and taking us down to League 1, from where we would never return.

Luzon was renamed as Luzer and 20 minutes into his regime chants of “You don’t know what you are doing”.

Demands were made that fans meet with Duchatalet, not his lying henchman and negatives were being sought and exploited.

But this is a results business.  Regardless of what is said on the fans forums, the majority of fans want to turn up to a match see us play good football and win.

So the recruitment of Johnson, the playing of Watt for 90 minutes, moving Cousins to central midfield and we have three home wins in a row and four out of five and all is well at the Valley.

Or is it?

When you distil the unrest it came down to poor communication of the direction that the club is going.  The poor football, previous years poor recruitment, the confusing departures of Yann and Powell, as well as the botched recruitment of Luzon, put the club under the microscope held by niche of us that are not only interested in the club on the field but also off the field now and in the future.

It is hard to know if all is well at The Valley, beyond the end of this season, because we really do not know Duchatalet's intentions.  Eagles and Johnson are only here on short term contracts, Bulot and Buyens are on loan from sister ship Liege.

Word has it that Katrien has said that we have exceeded our player’s budget.
The desire and re stated intention is that Charlton Athletic breaks even.  So fans are wary, without any explanation, of how we get there.

Will we release the short term and loan deals, bringing down expenditure, but then surely making us less competitive on the pitch?

Do we keep short term deals release loanees and make everyone operate on short term deals – creating uncertainty and only keeping those that cannot secure more security elsewhere.

How about selling the youth?  Well really only Gomez has any chance of commanding a sizeable fee and that is only based on potential, so I do not see a £5m up front transfer fee coming in there.

Maybe Katrien will be able to answer these questions in the forthcoming Bromley Addicks meeting, it would help the club and its relations with all fans if she were able to give some information on the behind the scenes strategy.

I know people want to talk directly to Duchatalet and people have branded Katrien a liar, but I don’t believe that this is the case.  I believe that she is honest and works hard for the club, but was seriously undermined during the sacking recruitment process by her boss.  Believe me I have been in similar situations with “entrepreneurial” bosses.  however, she will take a long time to rebuild her credibility with most fans.

Some questions were asked on Charlton Life about Duchatalet’s commitment for the future and even though I am more for than against this regime, I think they are worth each fan considering them:-

Let's see if he spends any cash in the summer outside the network
To be honest I don’t care where the players come from, as long as they improve the club.  Duchatalet has not been afraid to bring in players from outside the network and they have been the best of the bunch, until Tony Watt came in, JBG and Igor, so it’s the quality we should be looking at, inside or out.

Let's see if communication improves
For the vast majority of fans the communication is Tony Watts foot behind the ball, its what they care about, they leave the politics of business and home at the turnstiles.  But for some of us, an indication of where we are heading would be appreciated.  Katrien is charming, professional, rides the train with the fans (even now) and is attending meetings.  If she adds to this substance then even the majority of the fans who have an interest behind the scenes will be satisfied.

Let's see if he can resist interfering with team selection
To be honest, if he is picking the team now, then I wish he had been doing it since November.

Let's see if Luzon makes it past the six month mark
Well I expect that if he does not then we will be in another slump and we’d want him out.

Now that we have all but secured another season in the Championship, Luzon is going to have to avoid the traditional Charlton March seasonal slump or we’ll be meeting back in Woolwich, because for the majority of us … IT’S ALL ABOUT RESULTS

The reason why ......

Ole, ole, ole
Ole, ole
Tony Watt, Watt Watt

This is the reason why we support Charlton and not Man Utd or Arsenal or Man City or any other of the top clubs.

We lose games, more often than not we are on the wrong side of the score line, dropping points here and there.  Frustration abounds when supporting Charlton.

But every now and again comes a stream of bright sunlight, a moment in time when all  that frustration is swept aside.

The Play Off Final, The Division One Championship winning season and then there are individual games or even just moments of a game like Johnie Jackson last minute winner against QPR.

Today four wins out of five, when we could not see the next point, when the fans were questioning the commitment of the owners (and we still don't understand their game plan), but today, tonight, tonight was about football and Charlton and a celebration of quality football.

Forest probably had more possession, but we made the chances and were the more dangerous and throughout my time supporting / following Charlton when we have taken the ball into the corner to waste time we have lost possession.  Tonight Tony Watt, Frederick Bulot and Jordan Cousins kept the ball in the corner for the combined minutage that we have held the ball in my 40 years, it was a joy to watch.

The bubble of our recent success rose over night and it may burst overnight, but these games since Watford are why we follow Charlton and not the fancy dans of the Premiership.

COYR