First a Christmas reading recommendation. Neil Carter's book The Football Manager: a History is currently available on Abe Books for just over £6. Not only does it trace the evolution of the role over time, it has also has a lot of Charlton content as he drew substantially on the Jimmy Seed archive (and provided me with copies of parts of it).
I was hoping to set up a poll on the future of Nathan Jones, but the online survey tools are now a lot more expensive if one wants a decent response rate. Apologies for that.
One fan actually made a sensible suggestion of a plausible successor yesterday: Mark Robins. Quite why Stratford upon Avon businessman Doug King sacked the popular manager is unclear. His explanation was that he had fallen out with his No.2, but that lacks all credibility. If it was the league position, why didn't he say so? 'Our doubts are our traitors' as the Bard of Avon said.
In any event it appears that Robins is going to stay in the Championship with Hull City while the Sky Blues have appointed Frank Lumphard who is 'seeking redemption' as a manager. Good players are not necessarily good managers and average players are often the best managers.
Anyway on to Walsall. The current over emphasis on managers in football has a lot to do with the rise of electronic games in my view so that fans come to believe that the manager is really pushing buttons to move the players around the pitch.
The Chicago Addick has called for 'width, more width' and he may well be right. At least we should use the FA Cup game to give some of our younger promising players a chance to show what they can do even if it means giving up on the £75,000 prize money.
The Saddlers are currently second in League Two, having won five, lost one and drawn one at the Bescot which is, of course, alongside the M6. (Be warned that the junction for it coming from the south is a rather dangerous 'scissors' merge).
Walsall see Charlton as a scalp waiting to be taken but Jones is strangely confident: https://www.expressandstar.com/sport/football/2024/11/29/charlton-athletic-eager-to-build-on-recent-win-ahead-of-walsall-fa-cup-tie/
CAS Trust take heart from the fact that we have been unbeaten in our last nine encounters with Walsall (of course, we could draw and lose on penalties): https://www.castrust.org/2024/11/635751/
I forecast that Charlton will be unsaddled 2-1.
One of my treasured memories of the time when we were a successful club was 4-2 evening win at Walsall (12 wins in a row) and the report is still worth a read: https://addicksdiary3.blogspot.com/2017/09/remembering-key-victory-at-walsall.html
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