Crystal Palace loanee earns instant praise from Charlton boss after superb Valley display

Charlton manager Ben Garner praised the tactical intelligence of Jesurun Rak-Sakyi after the Crystal Palace winger had a debut to remember.

The 19-year-old winger, on a season-long loan from the Eagles, scored their opening goal in Tuesday night’s 5-1 thrashing of Plymouth Argyle at The Valley.

And Rak-Sakyi was given a standing ovation after he was subbed off just after the hour mark with the contest already long decided.

The Argyle defence found the teenager impossible to shackle as he looked a constant threat in a hugely encouraging first runout for the Addicks.

“It was a great debut for him Jes and he is only going to get better,” said Garner. “I think we’ve all seen tonight what a talent he has got. It’s great for him to score early on. Hopefully he can have a fantastic season for us.

“His biggest asset is his wonderful, wonderful balance. Couple that with close control and ability. But tactically tonight was most pleasing for me because he’s only had two days prep on how we wanted to press and be without the ball. He’s done that fantastically well for a young player.

“It was a really mature debut.”

The Addicks should have been further ahead before Jayden Stockley’s 41st-minute penalty, awarded for a handball by James Wilson. The Plymouth centre-back was shown a straight red card for stopping Charlie Kirk’s shot.

Sean Clare arrowed in a superb strike in the third minute of first-half injury time.

Although Morgan Whittaker cut the deficit in the 71st minute it was to get worse for the Devon outfit as Kirk and substitute Miles Leaburn made the outcome even more emphatic.

And Garner was delighted to see his Charlton team respond after a 1-0 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday in which his team won plenty of plaudits for their performance but did not put any points on the board.

“It wasn’t quite the perfect team performance – I’d have liked the clean sheet – but really good to react from Saturday because there was frustration, I wouldn’t go as far as disappointment, to not get anything,” he said. “You either get despondent and drop away or you roll your sleeves up and come back harder – which is what we did tonight.

“When you don’t score it’s [down to your] centre-forward. We want goals all through the side and we got that tonight. We needed that throughout the season. Really pleased to see a number of different goalscorers and there were probably one or two more that could’ve gone in as well.”

PICTURES: PAUL EDWARDS