Kevin Nolan’s big-match verdict: Charlton Athletic show class in first half – and grit in second – they will rise to every Championship challenge

FOREST 1
Adomah 78
BY KEVIN NOLAN AT THE VALLEY

When canny old substitute Albert Adomah slammed a 78th-minute equaliser into the roof of Charlton’s net, his first goal for Forest since joining them from Aston Villa on July 10 spelt immediate trouble for Charlton.

Their total domination of the first half was suddenly a dim memory. There was only one obvious winner of this keenly-fought duel and even their fiercest partisan had to admit it was unlikely to be them.

An uncomfortable, intensely awkward 12 minutes plus five more added stretched before the tiring Addicks as they sought to hang on to the point their unstinting effort entitled them to expect.

But this rebuilt side, expertly put together by that arch-competitor Lee Bowyer, do not have a quitter among them.

They continued to run, scrap and cover for each other as The Valley roared its unwavering support. There were a number of shattered players when referee Oliver Langford ended their ordeal, but their unbeaten start to the season  remained intact.

A total of eight points from their four opening games represents a solid start to life in the Championship. This latest point was one of which they can be proud; it was bitterly won and thoroughly deserved.

Until the closing minutes of the first half, Bowyer’s buoyant braves played their visitors off the park.

Had their finishing – and it should be said their luck – matched the scintillating football they produced, Adomah’s goal would have been no more than a consolation for Forest.

Before the inevitable Lyle Taylor goal gave them an 18th-minute lead, they should already have been in an unassailable position. And that’s where they would have been but for the defiant contribution made by Kosovan goalkeeper Arijanet Muric, a 20-year-old loanee from Manchester City.

It was a combination of Muric’s outstretched left foot and the base of his left post which repelled Jonathan Leko’s early header.

There was no such doubt about the incredible save he produced almost instantly to keep out Conor Gallagher’s point-blank effort, with Michael Dawson showing a veteran’s defensive nous to divert Leko’s follow-up to safety over the bar.

But even Muric could do nothing to prevent Taylor’s opener.

As the ball was switched with metronomic precision from red shirt to red shirt, Forest were mesmerised by the speed and accuracy of Charlton’s passing and movement. Josh Cullen turned the screw with a measured pass to send Leko into space on the right. The elusive trickster provided a delicious cross which enabled Taylor, having shaken off Dawson’s close attention, to glance an unstoppable header into the left-hand corner of Muric’s net.

There was no let-up in Charlton’s intensity but the second goal, which bitter experience warns is an indispensable product of total superiority, refused to arrive.

The Addicks continued to bewilder their opponents but, significantly, there were no clearcut chances. And with the first one-sided session on its last legs, the improving Trentsiders began to show signs of recovery from the pummelling they had received.

Indeed, Lewis Grabban seemed certain to score when Matty Cash’s half-blocked drive landed conveniently at his feet. Finding himself luckily goalside of Tom Lockyer, finishing from 12 yards seemed a formality until Lockyer, with nothing to lose, cleanly whisked the ball off his toe with a hell-for-leather tackle from behind. The Welshman’s intervention was divinely timed and executed, worth a goal to his side at a potentially demoralising time.

No doubt recipients of an interval broadside from their French-Tunisian manager Sabri Lamouchi, Forest re-emerged with a completely overhauled attitude and a new spring in their step. They should have fallen further behind, however, when Taylor stepped through two challenges on the right byline before carefully setting up Leko to finish from 10 yards. Leaning back disastrously, the winger’s shot was scooped haplessly over the bar. The relieved visitors had survived to fight on.

By now a spent force up front, the Addicks soldiered away defensively, with a newly-responsible Naby Sarr in commanding form. Having replaced Jason Pearce, Sarr rose to the occasion superbly, with the sometimes self-indulgent tricks and flicks deleted from his repertoire. As the lynchpin of Charlton’s spirited resistance, his natural ability came into its own. He was as helpless as his colleagues, unfortunately, as Adomah resolved an untidy scramble to equalise from Ben Watson’s left-wing corner.

There were other reasons for Bowyer to stay cheerful. The energetic hour-long debut of Erhun Oztumer was encouraging, Lockyer stood firm at Sarr’s elbow, while Deji Oshilaja withstood some agricultural challenges to make light of Chris Solly’s absence.

There will undoubtedly be more changes made when Brentford arrive on Saturday. It’s a 14-man game these days but the manager knows his one-for-all, all-for-one squad will rise to whatever challenge faces them.

That’s the least he expects from them. But they’re in the habit of giving him more.

Charlton (4-4-2): Phillips 6, Oshilaja 7, Lockyer 7, Sarr 8, Purrington 7, Cullen 7, Gallagher 7, Field 6 (Pratley 77), Oztumer 7 (Williams 62, 7), Leko 7 (Aneke 77), Taylor 8. Not used: Amos, Pearce, Bonne, Lapslie.

Photos by Paul Edwards and Keith Gillard