Very very frustrating. But fair play to Charlton, who came here with a game plan to hold us off and then try and nick a goal on the break, which worked to perfection. On the whole they defended very well, and the experience of Ben Haim and Bikey at the back really showed. Although we were unlucky in the sense that Jackson's shot was deflected, we gave him far too much time and space to hit the shot.
The fact of the matter is, if you don't take your chances at any level then you've got very little chance of winning the game. Today was different to our recent home games, in the sense that we didn't struggle in breaking Charlton down. We created a number of opportunities in the second half and failed to take them. Redmond should've easily converted that one on one, Grabban hit one wide that he should've buried, we had one effort cleared off the line (at least I think it was, I didn't really know what was going on),and we also had a goal ruled out, which I didn't really see clearly so can't really comment on.
But no matter how many chances we missed, we should've had a penalty without any shadow of a doubt. I was right in line with it, and it clearly hit Bikey on the arm. It was 0-0 at the time as well. I thought all in all the ref had an awful game. He gave every 50/50 Charlton's way and how he didn't manage to see that it hit Bikey's arm amazed me. I'm not trying to make excuses, but it was an awful decision.
I also think that Michael Turner was MOTM. Redmond was very good and I can't argue with the decision to give him man of the match, but for me Turner just edged it. I also thought Russell Martin was very good at centre back. And whilst Hoolahan was superb, if we're going to play him then we have to play 4-2-3-1. Adams said that he wasn't playing on the wing, he was playing in the whole, which meant that we had no-one down the left hand side, which is a definite disadvantage. I was also impressed with Howson when he came on.
Still, we're top of the league, and if we beat Rotherham then we'll stay top going into the international break. We're playing some great attacking football, and have only lost 2 out of our opening 10 games. I'm very happy.