Anthony Hayes has ambition to be first-team boss – but Charlton caretaker just focused on the short term

Anthony Hayes has an ultimate ambition to be a manager – but has added he has not given “any thought” to landing the Charlton Athletic manager’s job on a full-time basis.

The Irishman has stepped in as caretaker boss after Ben Garner was sacked on Monday.

Hayes was promoted to first-team assistant coach in July after previously being senior professional lead coach for the club’s U23s.

Asked by the South London Press if he wanted to be considered for the position, he said: “I haven’t given that any thought. I’ve purely been on trying to organise a training session for this morning and preparing meetings that we’ll go through with the players ahead of Stockport.

“My ambition is to go on to management in the future. I can’t control what decisions are made. I’ll do what I think is in the best interests of the football club and the team to try and achieve results in the short term.”

Charlton are back in action on Wednesday night in an FA Cup second round replay at Stockport County.

Garner took training on Monday before being relieved of his duties.

It leaves Hayes will little time to make drastic changes – although the former Brentford assistant head of coaching says that would not be the case anyway.

“With the events that unfolded yesterday, although there was prep done yesterday for the game, it changes slightly going into this morning,” said Hayes.

“I’ll take a little bit of a different approach today, in terms of matchday minus one, but a lot of it will be done in a team meeting. I won’t deviate too much from what has gone previously because the only reason I moved up to the first-team under Ben was because I really believed in the style he wanted to implement.

“Naturally with my background in the academy, and the style we have tried to play in the developement arena, it aligns very, very closely. There won’t be massive changes but I don’t want to give too much away in case anyone at the Stockport end is reading what you write in your paper.”

Hayes will be assisted by Jason Pearce, who retired in the summer as a player to move into the academy set-up.

“I have got to know Jason over my time at the football club,” said Hayes. “He has been a wonderful servant both as a player and now as a coach, in terms of developing the next generation of young players here.

“He’s been a model professional, he understands changing rooms, he’s been promoted and he’s obviously got some good ties and affiliations with some of the players in our squad. He’s going to be a massive aid to us in the coming days, preparing for Stockport and then moving into the weekend.”

Jayden Stockley completes his ban for violent conduct.

“In terms of the injured players, none of the long-term ones are ready to come back into the group,” said Hayes. “There are positives with Miles Leaburn and Terell Thomas back on the grass running again. They are not a million miles away, which is some good news.

“In terms of the squad, it will be a very similar make-up to what we had going into the Cheltenham game. Naturally we’ll have an eye on what certain players can do physically going into the weekend as well.”

PICTURE: KEITH GILLARD