Addickted to Luck: Charlton Report

Grimsby Town 0 Charlton Athletic 2
21 Sep 2004, Carling Cup Round 2

The Town stands were almost full and at least, oooooh, 224 Charltonians had made the trip to the heritage footballing theme park by the sea. Is this the way life used to be for them?

Town warmed up doing a silent can-can, whilst the lemon-coloured Trillionaires did some callisthenics, or was it calligraphy? They looked big, they were all recognisable, and some had white boots. A bit like Town then.

Town lined up in the 3-4-3 formation, as shown. The defence had another shuffle, this time Gordon was the central centre back, with young Young on the left. Everyone else was where you’d expect them to be, unless you have a Hockless fixation, of course.

The pre-match rabble rousing was led by Chairman Fenty, who got out his little red book and proclaimed a hero of a decade past. Out came Mr Clive Mendonca for a little wave and walk, he looked mighty embarrassed at this, or perhaps you can interpret that as humility. Wash your ears out. Humility, not humiliation; that was last season.

Dish of the Day: Justin Whittle’s Chicken Chow Mein, joining Boss Hogg Slade in the Chinese restaurant. Mange Tout! This is Grimsby, peas are for freezing and boiling to death.

1st half

Charlton kicked off towards the Pontoon, which displeased the moral majority within these walls. Oohh, fancy, no lumping out for a throw-in. Fancy-dan passing and movement, showing off their top table wares? Two can play at that game sunny Jims. And indeed two did, a rather cerebral opening, played out in respectful silence. A game of chess with an exchange of pawns early on, no advantage gained.

Young made two excellent challenges on limp-wristed Jeffers, surging upfield like a wing back, curling in dangerous crosses. Small moments of interest, some verve and vim, but nothing tangible. Enough to get us off our seats in hope, but no chances, no shots, just gentle pressure. Murphy started to twist and turn, to tap out a slow groove sideways. Looked good, but no danger. Charlton were dominating the lateral, going from Main Stand to Smiths/Stones/Findus and back again.

After about seven minutes Sestanovich was slow to react to a pass in his vague direction, near the half way line on the right. McDermott slid forward to tackle some anonymous Charltonian and Transit van man Stan successfully tackled Methuselah, sending the ball back towards the Town goal. The yellowman of London continued onwards, at some pace, pursued by our great big bear. Sestanovich clobbered the Charltonian with a scything wallop from behind. What a daft thing to do. Murphy brushed aside the sniffer dogs and carefully eyed up the wall and the wandering Williams. The ground awaited and MURPHY obliged, beautifully curving a dipping shot over the wall and under the bar, in the very top left hand corner of Williams’ goal. Absolute silence, no tuts, no groans, and no audible reaction from the slumbering trippers in the Osmond Stand. One attack, one goal. Let’s keep the score down shall we?

Whoah, no sir. Town felt sorry for themselves for a few seconds and them went for the rather cocky cockernee types. Murphy’s preening passing was replaced by Professor Pinault’s masterclass in prompting; by Sestanovich’s big-thighed dribbling; by Reddy’s irrepressible running; by Parkinson’s big-eared flapping. Town took over and footballed Charlton into the ground, forcing them face down in the dirt. A couple of minutes after the goal Crowe was tippled free inside the Charlton penalty area, on the left. The ball dropped, Crowe zipped forward and, from a narrow angle about 8 yards out, shivered a shot just over the angle of post and bar.