A Serious Lack of Festive Cheer...

If I had a Christmas wish, I'm damn sure I wouldn't waste it on Charlton. And anyway, it would take more than a Christmas miracle to change our fortunes any time soon.

 

Saturday's defeat ensures that we will be spending Christmas Day in the relegation zone and after the Boxing Day game at Bristol City we will have reached the half-way point of the season with the worst goal difference in the division. It could be a very bleak 2016!

 

My fellow blogger, Chicago Addick, wrote this excellent piece on Karel Fraeye earlier today: The Circus of Karel Fraeye. I think we all realised pretty quickly that Fraeye was going nowhere. His appointment permanent from the outset: the 'interim' tag just a very poorly actioned smoke-screen to fool very stupid people. It fooled nobody. Meire was foolish enough to think it would.

 

There is no recruitment process is there, Katrien? Another lie. It is painfully clear that Duchatelet was hoping for an upturn in results (a new manager bounce) before announcing his man in the post. It hasn't happened. It was never going to. I wonder if Roland and Meire are as embarrassed as they should be? 

 

On the desk of those poor chaps in the media team, still waiting issue, is a dusty memo from Meire that reads something like 'in light of the encouraging upturn in form and following an extensive and painstaking search, we have come to the conclusion that Karel Fraeye is the right man to lead us into the next exciting period in this club's history'.

 

Oh dear! The hapless Meire has got her work cut out justifying the appointment of a man who might well be 'nice enough' but is woefully short of the required basic credentials to run a Championship team.

 

I noticed yesterday that there are a few conspiracy theories doing the rounds surrounding Duchatelet's intentions, one of which relates to him actually orchestrating and  ultimately benefiting from Charlton's demise by justifying a lucrative sale of the Valley to property developers. Such is the state of the club at the moment, it's not hard to see how people have come to this highly pessimistic train of thought, although I'm less convinced. Mr. Duchatelet clearly doesn't give one ounce of a toss about us, so if he wants to put a 'for sale' sign up outside The Valley he will not waste time plotting our demise over a number of seasons.

 

Not that I can offer any explanation to his bizarre ownership. Nobody in their right mind would. 

 

As for me, I'm looking forward to my enforced hiatus over the holiday period and it will not be until Blackburn at home on the 23rd of Jan before I see the Addicks again. Heaven only knows what state we'll be in by then, but I'm not going to allow it to spoil my Christmas and a holiday with the family. I was going to do Colchester away on the 9th, but I can't be bothered now. Simple as that. I've decided to take my son to watch Arsenal v's Sunderland instead. He's an Addick, but he's found his own natural draw to the Gunners and I will not discourage it. What right would I have to anyway? I spent many happy Saturday afternoons on the North Bank at Highbury in my mid-teens with my Arsenal supporting mates, and I'm keen to visit the Emirates myself.

 

It will be nice going to watch a game of football knowing it can't spoil my Saturday night...

 

Anyway, enough of this negativity. Thank you to anyone who has taken the time to read anything I've wrote this year and especially those who take the time to comment. Have a great Christmas and New Year.