Lee Bowyer: My Charlton side have to cut out these schoolboy errors – we’re not good enough to gift teams the lead
BY LOUIS MENDEZ
Charlton boss Lee Bowyer says his side are gifting opposition sides goals with schoolboy-level errors at the moment.
A mix-up between George Lapslie and Deji Oshilaja laid the opening goal on a plate for Karlan Grant during the 4-0 reverse at Huddersfield last weekend – and Ben Purrington’s misplaced pass led to Middlesbrough man Paddy McNair bagging the only goal of the game this afternoon as the South Londoners slipped into the relegation zone for the first time this season.
The Addicks boss felt powerless as he watched on from the dugout on both occasions.
“I can’t control [Purrington’s mistake] and I can’t control what happened last week,” said the Charlton chief.
“Deji knows, you’re taught as a kid to just put your foot through it if you’re in trouble. Ben, a ten-yard pass with no one near George (Lapslie). I can’t control that. There’s a lot of things I can control but that I can’t.
“Frustrated. Disappointed, again. You can’t just give teams one-goal leads, no matter what league you play in. We ain’t good enough to give teams a one-goal lead, for sure. It’s amateur.
“A ten-yard pass and you put them through – bang, goal. Taking that aside, I thought second-half we were the better side. We have to be more ruthless. We had three clear-cut chances. We have to score at least one.
“I think we deserved at least a draw. I thought we were better than them in the second-half. They hit us on the break every now and then because we were pushing so hard for the goal. The lesson learned today is that we can’t keep giving teams one-goal leads. It drives me mad.
“Everything that you work on all week, all your preparation, it just goes out the window. Again, I thought we started well. We were on top. We looked like the team that was going to score and then we just gave them a goal.
“Kids stuff. Last week was the same. My boy is eleven and he wouldn’t make that mistake. Professional footballers can’t be making mistakes like that. Because you get punished.”
PHOTOS: KYLE ANDREWS
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Charlton Athletic is now on the beach at Dunkirk and are waiting to be pulled out of the Championship back to the safer home location of League One. Charlton Athletic as a club need to look far ahead and plan a future D-day of their own, but not until they have a strong force and the economy to back it.
Agree to a point with Lee on the mistakes to the goal but, I only see one team who started stronger and were the better team in the first half and that wasn’t Charlton . Much better in the second half but still missed a few chances . I question why we only started with 0ne up front . We seem to be worried about losing games rather that trying to win them . Confidence is lacking so mistakes will happen. Why are newly signed players not getting a look in think that says a lot about the jan signings . I still want to believe we can get out of this but, we need to be more positive in our approach. Remember we have a decent striker who seems to having to play deeper and wider rather than being in the box . C.o.y.r.