Those who turned up at Fratton Park today saw the worst Pompey performance this season by a distance. We were outbattled and even outplayed at times by a side 19th in the league. So much for "home banker", eh?
I'll get the ref rant out of the way now. Mark Clattenburg and his two assistants were dreadful. I don't often moan at officiating but Clattenburg felt the need to blow up for anything and give nearly every decision to the visitors. Why he didn't book Carson for timewasting until the 90th was baffling as he took an age to take every goal kick!
The linesmen also need to look at the rulebook and look up the definition of the offside rule. Countless times the flag went up when it shouldn't have done whilst Charlton got away with a couple of "offsides" that should have been called.
But that isn't an excuse for our shoddy performance. Oh no...
We didn't get going at all during the whole 90 minutes. Our defence looked a bit shaky as a unit at times. There was a distinct lack of fight and quality in the midfield whilst Kanu and Andy Cole did not look like a front two who were supposed to be working together. Charlton set their stall up and counter-attacked every time there was a break on and credit to them, because it worked.
Why were we so bad today? Maybe we were just complacent? Maybe the players were disappointed because of the lack of the support from us as we were too busy abusing Ben Thatcher for most of the game. Whatever reason it was, we were all holding our heads with disbelief when Amdy "never scored in my life" Faye scored a late goal against his former club. It was a deflected shot but they all count...
The only real chance we created was just before the end of the game when Andy Cole had a goalbound header well saved by Scott Carson. Apart from that, our few efforts were off target or simply gathered by the Charlton 'keeper.
As much as if felt like we were playing against 14 men at times today, we never deserved to win and we can't complain about Charlton taking all three points as they created a couple of other extremely good chances. Once again we have become victims of a late Addicks winner... they love playing against us don't they?
These things happen in football. Every team has a game where they are punished by a struggling team in a game where nothing goes for them. I just hope we get the right reaction from the players after a very disappointing performance. With results being kind to us today we have blown a great chance to really cement a place in the top 6. Now, we are looking over our shoulders with worry having only taken 2 points from the last 12.
Pompey Player Ratings
David James: 7 - Some good saves and takes. Had no chance with the goal.
Glen Johnson: 6 - Solid but not outstanding.
Linvoy Primus: 5 - Made a few mistakes.
Sol Campbell: 7 - Solid and made one great saving tackle on Rommedahl when he was one on one with James.
Djimi Traore: 7 - Probably our best player today, but that isn't really saying much. Another good display from the "crap signing" anyway.
Lauren: 5 - Looks like he needs to find his match sharpness which is understandable considering a lengthy absense from first-team football.
Pedro Mendes: 5 - Wasn't anywhere near his best.
Sean Davis: 4 - Outbattled by the Charlton midfield and kept giving the ball away.
Kanu: 5 - Didn't get into the game at all.
Andy Cole: 5 - Had a couple of strikes but otherwise didn't do much.
Subs
Jamie Ashdown
Richard Hughes
David Thompson
Rodolphe Douala: 6 - Didn't actually look too bad when he came on.
Benjani: N/A - Wasn't given enough time and should have came on earlier.