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28 January 2013

Charlton 1 Sheffield Wednesday 2


After a forgettable first half, Charlton put together an exquisite team goal to take a lead which was retrospectively merited by the way they played in the next 30 minutes or so. But then it started getting a bit slack and the team hardly seemed to notice as Weds got the two late goals.

It wasn't depressing to see, it was annoying. There will always be unexpected defeats, but there was a kind of slow motion car crash feel about this one as if all the players had decided there was nothing they could do to stop it.

I've written before about Charlton's propensity to give away goals in the last 10 minutes, and this was perhaps the clearest example. After the game, there were predictable questions about why no substitutions were made until it was too late. Those questions are fair enough, but Chris Powell obviously thinks it's best to leave the team unchanged as much as possible, rather than risk disrupting their pattern of play. Normally I'd agree, and no-one can say that earlier subs would definitely have made the outcome any different.

But the late switch-off is a recurrent problem, and we still don't seem to have an answer.

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