Seems I was right to hit the revenge button yesterday as a means to get the team stirred up for tomorrows game at the City Ground. Three points thrown away eighteen years ago at the sad Sainburys still rankles with me and Pards also has reason to be aggrieved with the Midlanders after a last minute winner there back in his Fizzy days with the Hamsters. He mentioned it yesterday and seems determined to put matters right.
So following on from an article by Man To Varney on doctorkish yesterday expanding on his feelings about our rightful place in the world, perhaps its just the right time to compare the lineups from our last game in Nottingham with tomorrows likely team.
Premiership boys we all were back in January 2007 when we travelled to the City Ground for an FA Cup Third Round tie and in the coach were the following players: Up front were the starting eleven, Myhre, Kish, Traore, El Karkouri, Jon Fortune, Denis Rommedahl, Faye, Holland, Ambrose, Marcus Bent and Jimmy Hasselbaink while the back row were occuped by the bench-warmers Darren Randolph, Diawara, Hughes, Jerry Thomas and Lloyd Sam.
Nine full internationals in the 16 and although a heady mixture of underachievers in our book ( sorry Kish), Pards in his 4th game in charge rightly expected more from a team languishing in 19th place in the table against a side far below us in Tier 3.
Forest though were on a high sitting in 3rd place, just 1 point behind the leaders Scunthorpe and keen to get back to winning ways after the previous weeks 5-0 hammering by 2nd placed Oldham.
Pards spells out what happened in an interview yesterday under a heading entitled "Pardew's personal agenda" and recalls how "complacency and a lack of desire and commitment had set in within the group", perhaps something that we could have told him when he started the job. A 0-2 scoreline dumped us out and left us to concentrate on League matters.
Tomorrows team is likely to see just three (or maybe 4) players left from that 16 just 20 months later with Fortune, Holland and Sam all likely to start in a unchanged team from Doncaster that reads:
Weaver; Cranie, Hudson, Fortune, Youga: Sam, Bailey, Holland, Bouazza; Gray and Varney.
Its a younger, fresher side and after the disasterous Monica era looks more like a Charlton team should look and more to the point it's been build by Pardew and if we ignore the homegrown talent in Fortune and Sam, there's only Youga and Holland remaining from Curbs' days although I suppose there's still Darren Ambrose and the inscrutable ZiZi waiting in the wings.
So there's really no excuses Pards, its an unbeaten run we want and against a side on a run of 4 consecutive defeats, conceding eleven in the process, what better time to exact vengence and walk away with another 3 points safely in the bag.
3 comments:
If you mean that Forest game in Mar '90 I also remember it all too well. An unexpectedly lively Charlton really tore into a good Forest side, but had only one goal to show for it. Forest were nowhere and we were outraged at some real thuggery perpetrated by Pearce on Johnny H. Injustice was done in the end, with a scrappy Forest equaliser in the dying moments.
Man To Varney
Well, Man to Varney, I can only add that your memory is obviously better than mine as the games details are condensed into the simple fact of Joe McLaughlin trying to play football in his own penalty area, and losing the ball, right in front of me when a hoof into the stands was all that was needed. And the recollection of sitting in a Highgate bar afterwards over a pint of Guinness dreaming of what might have been.
Faye, Marcus Bent and Piggybank all in the same side - no wonder we lost - what a miserable day, and my daughter's first game!
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