Saturday 17th August 2024, Kick-off 12.30
EFL League One
The Valley, Charlton
Admission: Season Ticket
Programme: £6.00 (including handbook)
Attendance: 15,126 (1,919 away)
A match report can be read by clicking here , also copied and pasted below
Brief video highlights can be viewed by clicking here
Kevin Nolan’s Valley View: Charlton Athletic 1-0 Leyton Orient
A late, late winner brought delirium to Charlton fans in the early Saturday kick-off against Leyton Orient. KEVIN NOLAN reports from a sunny Valley.
After sliding tamely out of the EFL Cup on Tuesday, the decks were neatly cleared for Charlton’s first home league game of the brand new season. In a rerun of last August’s opener, their visitors were again Leyton Orient in a second staging of the Blackwall Tunnel derby.
It’s safe to say that Orient won’t be looking back fondly on either visit to The Valley. Almost exactly a year ago, they lost 1-0 to a late George Dobson goal. On this occasion, they were beaten by the same scoreline, with the winner struck deep even later by new boy Luke Berry.
Losing at football is hard to take under any circumstances. It has been known to break up relationships and wreck beautiful friendships. An unfeeling word here, an unthinking slight there and the damage can be irreparable. So it was easy to empathise with the East Londoners’ heartache on their way back across the river.
Until Berry struck, there was little to enthuse Charlton either. They had enjoyed marginally the better of a dour encounter and just about deserved the points. Their second 1-0 victory suggests that while goals might be hard to come by, Nathan Jones has already sorted out a notoriously porous defence. The visit of Bolton Wanderers next Saturday will reveal more.
During the early exchanges, the Addicks suffered a serious setback which, to their credit, they absorbed gamely. Caught painfully by Sean Clare’s carelessly-timed challenge as he eluded the Charlton old boy along the left touchline, Josh Edwards was stretchered off following extensive treatment, to be replaced by speed merchant Thierry Small.
Edwards has won admirers as an important component of Jones’s much improved rearguard but Small proved a more than capable replacement.
Until Edwards’ untimely departure, which earned Clare mild but dedicated abuse, nothing much had happened. The visitors had made little of one or two openings before, on the half hour, their hosts countered with a chance of their own. Skipper Greg Docherty was its creator, his shrewd cutback eluding Gassane Ahadme but met solidly by Berry, whose improvised volley was blocked by Jordan Brown.
It wasn’t much of a chance, to be honest, and hardly warrants reporting, but there’s space to be filled.
Before the interval, a virtually unemployed Will Mannion was briefly called into action to collect a feeble effort from Charlie Kelman. Orient had made no impression on the vice-like grip maintained by the muscular, uncompromising Lloyd Jones and Alex Mitchell, with Kayne Ramsay and Macaulay Gillesphey in similarly uncompromising form.
Midfield superiority, meanwhile, was enforced by Conor Coventry and Docherty. But a goal seemed equally unlikely at both ends.
After the break, Berry’s drive was blocked by Brown; Coventry’s curler dipped over the bar; and Ramsay’s vicious drive cartwheeled off Lewis Warrington, beat Zach Hemming but ballooned harmlessly over the bar.
A goalless stand-off seemed certain as eight added minutes were ordered. And then out of the blue – or red, actually – Charlton scored!
Big Chuks Aneke had entered the action in the 76th minute to add savvy and physical commitment as the Addicks sought desperately to break the deadlock. He hadn’t actually achieved much success in his endeavours but, as usual, proved impossible to discourage. Battling to win Gillesphey’s long ball from Brandon Cooper in the air, he managed an awkward touch down to Coventry.
Coventry, again Charlton’s major playmaker, laid off an adroit pass to Berry, who instantly directed a low, right-footed shot beyond Hemming’s despairing dive on its way into the bottom-left corner.
It was a finish born of experience and know-how and had the effect of transforming The Valley’s frustration into wild, unrestrained celebration. The euphoria reached the press box, as it sometimes does – or always does, if truth be told.
There is nothing – but nothing – like the late winner to rob grown people of their common sense. It briefly turns them into kids doing what they did again…
Charlton: Mannion, Ramsay, Gillesphey, Mitchell, Jones, Coventry, Campbell (Aneke 76), Berry, Ahadme (Godden 76), Docherty, Edwards (Small 28). Not used: Maynard-Brewer, Anderson, Watson, Kanu. Booked: Berry, Nathan Jones.
Orient: Hemming, James (Sweeney 78), Happe, Cooper (Beckles 66), Agyei, Brown, Donley (Jaiyesimi 70), O’Neill (Perkins 70), Kelman, Clare, Ribiero (Warrington 66). Not used: Howes, Pratley. Booked: Clare, James, Agyei, Sweeney, Richie Wellens.
Referee: Edward Duckworth.
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