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Tuesday 11th February 2025. EFL League 1. Charlton Athletic 2 (Matt Godden 54 pen, Macaulay Gillesphey 89) v Peterborough United 1 Malik Mothersille 63 pen). Attendance: 11,653 inc. 714 away fans.
Newark. No doubt there are a good few of you who will consider this to be a very apt starting point for my journey to Charlton by Thames this evening, given that the place name is an anagram of wanker. There are many, many trains that pass through East Retford upon Idle at night, but none of them actually stop there late enough for me to get home from my chosen midweek game of association football.
I parked up (very considerately, of course) five minutes walk away from the station, so I could drive up t’A1 for the last twenty miles of my return journey, from Newark on Trent, at unearthly o’clock on Wednesday morning. Travel tip: do NOT park in the station car-park at Newark Northgate, it's expensive. There are much cheaper (and even free) options available within easy walking distance of the rail terminal, so get there a few minutes early and have a look around. Alternatively just set your Google Maps app for either kiNursery Court or Warburton Street.
The last time that I saw Posh in action was at London Road on Boxing Day, when it would be fair to say that Mansfield Town battered them. It was such a dreadful performance, that I genuinely thought their manager, Darren Ferguson, was deliberately trying to get himself the sack so he could trouser a lump sum pay-off.
But he was still in situ at the Valley tonight, so if that had been his intention, then it hasn't worked thus far. However, talking to a few Peterborough fans on the way home, it became apparent that they would quite happily chip in a few quid of their own to any whip round being collected to facilitate such a change in the club's management structure. But even if he did go, he’d no doubt be back at the helm again before long, because that's how things seem to work at the Weston Homes Stadium.
Arriving at my destination earlier than anticipated (Christ on a bike! When did the trains start running on time?), I decided that a visit to the Valley Cafe, close to Charlton station, was in order. Sausage and creamy mash, with lashings of onion gravy… and a drink, weighed in at just £8, bargain!
What appeared to be a coachload of Posh supporting OAP’s descended on the premises, just as I was finishing off my slap up tea. The presence of pensioners in any eatery generally indicates that they offer good value for money and also speaks volumes for the quality of the fodder on offer. But hey! Don't just take my word for it.
You will doubtless be glad to hear that that's the long-winded and wibbling travel and culinary delights section of this blog entry completed for this episode. Perhaps we should move on from all of this peripheral waffle and have some football stuff now instead.
In the blue corner, having travelled seventy-five miles due south from the north-west corner of the county of Cambridgeshire, we have Peterborough United, a team that (much) better things were expected from this season, but who find themselves in the deep end of the League 1 pool, floundering out of their depth without their Speedo Water Wings on.
They desperately needed a positive result tonight, even a point would have been better than nothing, as they finished the night just one place above towards the relegation berths. Shrewsbury Town, the team directly below them, have seen a recent upturn in results since Gavin Ainsworth took over the managerial reigns in Salop.
Alas, although they had already shown more fight and inclination in the opening ten minutes of tonight's encounter, than they did throughout the entire duration of the aforementioned Boxing Day drubbing by Nigel Clough’s Stags, it was all to no avail. Because they were up against a side riding high on the crest of a wave of momentum. Namely: in the red corner, Nathan Jones’ currently in-form Addicks.
An impressive run of results has seen Charlton take massive strides forward, with no small amount of conviction, into the play-off positions. Not so long ago it looked to all intents and purposes, that the best that the Valley faithful could look forward to, was another season of third-tier, mid-table, mediocrity. But since Charlton lost at Rotherham United on January 18th, a rather gruesome episode that features elsewhere within this Substack version of THE66POW, they have played six times; drawing once (away at Blackpool) and picking up a maximum fifteen points from the other five games, including this one against Posh.
The Addicks only won tonight's game by a one goal margin, with Macaulay Gillesphey heading past the resilient Posh keeper Jed Steer as late as the 89th minute, to secure the win, a statistic which gives the impression that the visitors had run Charlton close to the wire. I s’pose that contextually, inasmuch as the only statistics that really count in the final analysis are the actual goals scored by either team, then they did. But for long spells of the game, the hosts were all over Peterborough like a prickly heat rash.
And had it not been for Steer, the game would have been cut, dried and over as a contest long before Charlton finally forced the issue so late in the mix. Peterborough’s keeper, a former England youth team player, across three different age groups, actually played 19 times on loan for Charlton during 2018. He is eligible to play for Scotland (maternal family ties) and on tonight’s showing, Steve Clarke should be making it a matter of no small importance to get him involved in their international set up ASAP.
Ironically, Angus Gunn, Scotland’s number 1, played in the same Norwich City youth set-up as the current Posh keeper, when they were both starting out in the game. Having moved on from the Canaries, Steer then joined Aston Villa, so the subsequent move to Peterborough is obviously quite a big step up in stature for the agile thirty-two year old.
Lee Swabey reminded me of one of those non-league referees I used to have to deal with, who were finicky as feck and overly nit-picking, because they had just spotted an assessor monitoring their performance from the stands. Stop-start-stop-start-stop-effing start. “FFS! Referee, we haven't come to watch you!” You all know the type. “You’re killing the game ref, let it flow a bit!” Two minutes in and Lloyd Jones is already on a yellow card, as Mr Swabey put down an early marker that he’s going to be a highly strung and over-officious on this fine yet chilly evening
Does it amuse anybody else, I wonder, that Lloyd Jones is also the name of a plumbing and heating company, based just down the road from my homestead in the historic market town of East Retford? Hmm… Ok! So it's just me then. But y’never know they might chuck a few free tap washers my way, next time I'm walking the hound past their place, now that they’ve had a free plug on t’interweb. Tyreece Campbell and Thierry Small, were proving to be a proper handful for the visitors, taking them on through both channels in tandem, as Charlton demonstrated what and attractive and entertaining team they are fast becoming (yes, you read that correctly).
Matt Godden, Luke Berry and Josh Edwards all went close to giving Charlton the lead, but half-time came and the game was still goalless. Steer was impressing everyone present with a man of the match shift between the posts and was also pivotal to Ferguson’s slow-timing game management plan. Though any team in poor Peterborough’s perillous position, ponderously pursuing points (Woo hoo! Go me! THE66POW, the blog with extra added alliteration) would have done exactly the same thing, so you can't really criticise them for that.
In the 54th minute, Charlton finally made their long overdue breakthrough. Sam Hughes conceded a penalty when Campbell’s shot hit his arm and Godden netted from the resultant spot-kick via Steer’s fingertips. Just a few minutes later, Posh’s woes were compounded when Emmanuel Fernandez was dismissed for a brutal challenge on Small out on the wing, near the halfway line. But the ten men rallied and against all odds, equalised in the 64th minute, when Kayne Ramsey tripped Ricky Jade-Jones inside the Addicks area and Malik Mothersille restored parity from the penalty spot.
Charlton bombarded the visitors area. The sounds of ‘oohing and aahing’ filled the night air as chance after chance went begging. In the 89th minute Campbell’s inch perfect cross picked out Craig Docherty, but his thumping header deflected wide. Alex Gilbert hurried across to take the flag-kick, Macaulay Gillesphey, leapt to meet the meet the incoming cross, amid a clutch if players… and though he had to lean backwards to make a clean contact, connected with his forehead and directed the ball into the bottom corner of the net. Cue pandemonium all around me FT: Addicks 2 v Posh 1.
There wasn't enough time left for the visitors to make another Lazarus like comeback and it came to pass that Charlton finished the night in fifth place. Dare to dream? Nathan Jones’ side travel to Birmingham City at the weekend, in what will be a tough test against a team that consolidated their lead at the top of League 1 with a 4-0 win over Cambridge United. Posh make the relatively short trek down to Stevenage on the same day, a game that they now mustn't lose after the way other results at the foot of the table went against them tonight.
It was good to catch up, albeit briefly, with some friendly and familiar faces from the Mansfield Town ranks, on Kings Cross station, who'd been to see Nigel Clough's team (who are presently suffering from a bit of a wobble after initially doing well at the outset of the season) at Leyton Orient. Let's hope that the Stags can get back on track ASAP, eh! I concocted a tale of woe, to hoodwink a sympathetic train guard into allowing me to use me ticket on an earlier service to the one I was supposedly booked on. What a nice man he was! Unlike me, I’m a flipping fibbing, frequently feckless, fraudulent fucker, sometimes 😉
Next up: Saturday, 15th February 2025, EFL League 1. Birmingham City v Charlton Athletic.