Bring on the Invincibles

No.1 Iceland Addick Olafur Johansson

A few weeks ago Preston North End were being portrayed as the new invincibles.   Their manager Phil Brown, surely one of the most popular and respected figures in British football, was given a two page spread in The Football League Paper.  However, the wheels have come off since then and we must be reasonably confident of victory.

Iceland Addick and former Voice of the Valley contributor Olafur Johansson has been in touch from with a question.   He asks why, if the North End club of Preston is so designated, why is the Southend club is called just that?   Or do they share a ground with the fans favouring the north or south ends?   If anyone can help, he can be found in a fish shed in Grindavik.

I have some good memories of Charlton playing Preston from the 1950s when, of course, Tom Finney, regarded as one of the greatest players of his day, was in their side.    In the 1953/4 season we played them on a Thursday (early closing day so you could get along if you worked for the Co-op) and the crowd of 18,208 included members of the crew of a Brazilian warship anchored in Greenwich.  We won 2-1 and finished two places above them in the table.

In 1954/5 we lost 0-4 at home, perhaps because Jimmy Seed was away in Dublin signing up Jimmy Gauld (a  mixed blessing) and they finished one place above us.   In 1953 we won 2-1 but Finney was playing in the England v. Scotland match at Wembley.  At the end of the 1952/3 season we finished fifth, but they were runners up which says something about what a force they were in English football in those days.

Today I am off to Kent to give a public lecture at East Malling.   I shall see if I can find my Addicks cufflinks and slip in a reference to Charlton to see if anyone in the audience is Addickted.