Charlton 0 Barcelona 3

Preston probably aren't a very good team. But tonight, Matthew, they were F C Barcelona, dominating and easily winning a game when you'd imagine they'd have gratefully accepted a point. Instead, throughout the second half, with the points in the bag, they continued to press forward, not even bothering to waste time. A fantastic night out for the unsurprisingly sparse band of Lancastrians; a terrible nightmare for the almost equally exiguous home support.

What on earth has gone wrong? Two months ago, after the win against Hull, I wrote that

These guys really are playing for each other ... This looks like a team that can make us proud.

Tonight they made us angry and in some way ashamed of that early optimism. How could we have been so stupid? Tonight they looked like they had never met. Or if they had, it had been in some encounter so shameful - like a meeting of the Bullingdon Club - that they could no longer look each other in the eye.

No communication within the team, no movement off the ball, no ideas. It's as bad as in the last days of Pardew or Peeters: a team in total collapse. You could blame individuals, but when they're all as useless as they were tonight, it's a sign that something deeper is wrong, something that we, as outsiders, will never know.

Guy Luzon is the obvious suspect. He may not have the squad he'd want, but even the coach of a primary school team would expect to get more passion out of a team than this team showed. On the other hand, he knows Roland Duchatelet's record better than most. He's clearly - understandably - in fear of losing his job and his mental state must infect the players. I still don't know if Luzon is a good manager or not. Maybe no-one - not even a new Alex Ferguson - could meld this bunch of players into a good team.

Tonight was one of those games where the only reason the stadium wasn't empty at full-time is that people stayed on to express their dissatisfaction. On Twitter the overwhelming consensus was that Duchatelet is destroying the club. His model isn't working.
 
I've never been a huge fan but I appreciate that his investment has been crucial. But his footballing judgement is atrocious. And believe me, I know about atrocious judgement. I could have spent the evening in the warm comfort of a pub with some congenial friends. Instead, here I am at nearly midnight trying to be fair to a man who's wrecking the football club I love.