Charlton Athletic 0 v 0 Hull City

Saturday 25^th August 2012

Football League Championship

The Valley, Charlton

Admission: Season Ticket

Programme: £3.00

Attendance: 16,202

Match Rating: 2

After three seasons away from The Valley – bar a handful of matches – today would be my second visit to The Valley in four days, for what would be almost as difficult a game for Charlton as Tuesday’s was against Leicester. I was looking forward to this game in particular though, having spent a considerable amount of time in Hull with an ex girlfriend and visiting Boothferry Park on several occasions.

Charlton have opened their season with four points from their first two games, whilst Hull opened their season with a 1-0 victory at home to Brighton, before losing by the same scoreline away at Blackburn. Last season they finished in eigth place, seven points shy of a play-off position. They have certainly shown their intent to return to the Premiership as soon as possible, having appointed Steve Bruce over the summer, and signing the joint top scorer in the 2. Bundesliga last season, Nick Proschwitz, for £2.6 million from SC Paderborn.

The game would start off in clear, sunny conditions, although rain would arrive midway through the first half. The first half was an even affair, both sides having chances without ever really convincing they would score the opening goal.

Half time heralded a dramatic worsening of conditions with a thunderstorm of heavy rain, loud thunder and bright lightening. The heavy rain persisted, and made the pitch conditions increasingly treacherous. No standing water was ever evident, but the ball did not run truly along it, and players going to ground to make tackles slid much further than usual. Unsurprisingly this made playing football difficult for both teams, and one feared that the game could be decided by an error caused by the conditions. Charlton had a goal ruled out for offside, after an initial shot from Bradley Wright-Phillips was saved and Yann Kermorgant shot into the net through a crowd of players. As the second half wore on, it then looked increasingly inevitable that Hull would snatch a winner, most notably in injury time when Ben Hamer made a fabulous double save. But in the end, a goalless draw was the final outcome of an uninspiring game, as Charlton retained their unbeaten record whilst Hull will probably be disappointed to return to Humberside with just a point.



A match report of this game can be found here