EFL League One
The Valley, Charlton
The Valley, Charlton
Admission: Season Ticket
Programme: £3.00
Attendance: 12,707 (888 away)
Well, it was certainly very tempting to give this game a miss, being a midweek fixture, rain forecast and Charlton remaining in very average form. Inevitably, I did decide to go, and whilst much of the game saw the Addicks play well, particularly during the first half, a second half capitulation did leave me feeling why did I bother making the long journey to The Valley this evening.
Despite picking up a point on Saturday following a 2-2 draw at home to Portsmouth, Charlton actually dropped a place in the table, coming into this game in 22nd place following a solitary win and three draws from their opening nine league games. Following promotion from League Two last season, Bolton have had a decent start to their League One campaign, having picked up three wins and three draws from their opening nine league games, but they had lost their last two games, at home to Rotherham and most recently away to Sunderland.
On a mostly wet evening, Charlton actually started strongly, and duly took the lead on 14 minutes. A Bolton ball forward was intercepted Sean Clare, who drove forward before feeding Jonathan Leko to the right of the penalty area, he crossed the ball into the centre, and Josh Davison stuck out his boot out to tap the ball into the roof of the net. The Addicks were on top for most of the first half and had decent chances to extend their lead, but on 41 minutes, the visitors got back on level terms as right back Adam Matthews, not for the first time (this week), allowed a player - Oladapayo Afolyan - to cut inside instead of being shown the line, before unleashing a lovely low shot from the edge of the area which curled just inside the far post.
The second half started off evenly, and both sides had their chances to take the lead, and it was Bolton who broke the deadlock on 73 minutes, Gethin Jones crossing from the right, and Kieran Lee saw his shot from just behind the penalty spot take a deflection to send the ball past MacGillivray. The visitors opened up a two goal lead on 81 minutes, when Afolyan speculative shot took a couple of deflections before landing at the feet of Lee all alone just outside the six yard box, and he had the simple task of striking the ball into the net, And the scoreline became rather ugly in the first minute of added on time, when Bolton scored their fourth, Antoni Sarcevic timing his run perfectly to beat the offside trap to run onto a ball played forward from the left by Lee, and he eventually rounded MacGillivray before slotting the ball home. Unsurprisingly in the current circumstances, the atmosphere was toxic around The Valley, with the crowd loudly booing and chanting for the removal of Nigel Adkins as well as hardly positive comments about the players. It was a very harsh scoreline on Charlton, as for long periods they were on top, but paid the price for failing to convert chances, and also showed up the glaring weakness of the team in all-too-readily caving in and throwing in the towel.
Short video highlights of this match can be viewed by clicking here
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