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Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Our season as seen by Sky Sports

An interesting external view on our season is provided by Sky Sports - I have added some comments of my own in square brackets:

The Addicks had another up and down season with some glorious highs and some
disappointing lows and finished the season in 13th place. All this was frustrating after the dazzling start the club enjoyed as they sat second in the table after half a dozen games.

Charlton's early away from was excellent, while they stuttered a little at home, but this all changed at the turn of the year when they embarked on an excellent unbeaten run at The Valley but did not win any of their 11 road trips in 2006.

Only five teams scored fewer goals than Charlton and the Addicks would have struggled even more but for the 18 strikes contributed by new signing Darren Bent. Despite being the top scoring English-born forward in The Premiership, Bent was omitted from England's World Cup squad.

Only four teams had a worse shooting accuracy than Charlton who hit the target with just 39 percent of their attempts. Together with the fourth-lowest tally of shots, this wayward shooting contributed heavily to a lack of goals for the Addicks.

Defensively, Charlton did not do too badly, but often conceded several goals in the same match - 11 teams scored three or more goals against The Addicks in a single game.

One thing the new manager will be looking to address is Charlton's below par passing. [Some of the Addickted, somewhat unfairly, call this the 'Kishishev effect'] Only five teams gave the ball away more often than the Londoners who completed just 71 percent of their distribution and only one team in the top flight attempted fewer crosses than the 682 Curbishley's team fired over.

Charlton did finish top of one particular category and that was points dropped from winning positions. No team in the league dropped fewer. Charlton gave up just three points from games where they got ahead over the course of the season, which bodes well for the team to be inherited by a new manager. They won 13 out of the 14 games where they got ahead, but on the other hand, they only recouped eight points from games where they fell behind.

Charlton were also slow starters, scoring just three goals in the opening 15 minutes of matches, but they were particularly susceptible just after half-time. [Sort out the tea]. No team conceded a higher number of goals this season than the
Londoners in the 15 minute period after the break.

Only one side picked up fewer yellows than the 45 Charlton accrued and The Addicks were one of the cleanest teams in the league overall. [Perhaps we're too nice for our own good as the Fair Play League is a bit of a lottery].

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