There is a hum of optimism among fans with prospective owners ESI hoping to complete a takeover before Christmas The last time Charlton Athletic played Huddersfield Town and Hull City in the same week, they ended up reimbursing supporters’ travel costs following a 5-0 shellacking only to get hit for six five days later. That 11-0 aggregate defeat almost four years ago followed a nine-match winless streak, including a meek surrender to Colchester United, then bottom of League One, in the FA Cup third round. Charlton were drowning in the Championship at a time when the arrival of new, and usually obscure, out-of-work managers marked the changing of the seasons. In the midst of the despised Roland Duchâtelet’s reign, those...
Protests against the owner are on hold with Doncaster lying in wait for Friday’s League One play-off semi-final second legBe it mock funeral processions, plastic pigs or packets of crisps pausing play, it has been impossible to escape the negativity that has clouded Charlton Athletic in recent seasons.The deeply unpopular owner, Roland Duchâtelet, remains the elephant in the room as uncertainty continues to reign, but things have been going so swimmingly on the pitch that, for now at least, the protests are on hold and the off-field noise has been somewhat muffled; a run of eight wins from nine matches has propelled Lee Bowyer’s side to within touching distance of a return to the Championship. For fed-up and fatigued fans,...
Blackpool supporters can finally talk of Owen Oyston in the past tense, which may just offer hope to those at Charlton, Coventry and elsewhere with inadequate or reviled ownersThat was a belter of a line from Lieven De Turck, representing the always bewildering Roland Duchâtelet at a forum of Charlton Athletic supporters a few nights ago, when the man reputedly in charge of trying to sell the club floated what viewers of Blackadder might recognise as the “cunning plan” option.He didn’t put it in those terms, of course, but equally I’m not even sure Baldrick would have come up with something quite so brilliantly harebrained as standing up in front of a room of already exasperated football fans and proposing,...
Karl Robinson takes time off from Charlton’s League One promotion push to lend LGBT-friendly Charlton Invicta a hand as part of Football v Homophobia’s month of action“Now we’re like the Harlem Globetrotters,” Karl Robinson says, excitedly, only the players smiling back at the Charlton Athletic manager, gradually getting to grips with a passing drill, are not his.Those determined to dazzle are a dozen Charlton Invicta players, who play for the LGBT-friendly team affiliated with the club’s community trust. It is the first time a professional manager has taken a session of this kind. Related: Charlton Invicta show way forward for LGBT footballing community | Nick Miller Continue reading...
Disgruntled supporters are taking their fight to the club’s owner, Roland Duchâtelet, who last watched a game at The Valley in October 2014On Saturday morning some Charlton Athletic supporters will tuck into a free breakfast at The Valley and board coaches laid on by the club to transport them to Sixfields for their match at Northampton. At the same time a similar number will be travelling in an entirely different direction. An estimated 200-250 Charlton loyalists are off to Sint-Truiden, the Flemish town that happens to be home to the club’s Belgian owner, Roland Duchâtelet, in a bid to air their gripes.Charlton are one of a number of clubs embroiled in a malaise that is not helped by a fractured...