Down at The Valley

Alan Pardew is now the new Charlton Athletic manager and his namesake Curbs is head honcho of West Ham. Such is the managerial maypole or merry-go-round. With Les Reed in charge of the Addicks, the Charlton board said "stop it now, I want to get off," signing a two-year contract with him and then sacking him a week later, after realising their mistake. Even Newcastle is not guilty of such manager profligacy. It all smacks of Samuel Johnson's pithy comment that a second marriage is a triumph of hope over experience.
For so long at The Valley they had been wedded to Alan Curbishley that upon his departure they were left foraging around for a suitable manager prepared to work within modest means. Unfortunately, on the rebound as they were, they allowed themselves to be duped by their new manager Iain Dowie into blowing next season's transfer budget as well as this one's. Charlton had been widowed and were so desperate for solace that they believed him. The club did need strengthening, but not with the junk Dowie, previously a shrewd manager, invested in.
Having a manager for 16 years, Charlton rapidly became disillusioned with Dowie and just as Athletic were turning a corner for the better on the pitch, the board turfed him out of The Valley and changed the locks. The usual dip in form come springtime continued into the new season and the board panicked (they didn't burn his clothes though, promising continued support in Dowie's legal wrangle with Simon Jordan, Crystal Palace's chairman and ex-employer of Dowie). The board turned to Les Reed, promoting him from no.2 because that way they wouldn't have to pay compensation to any club in poaching a manager. Having divorced themselves from Dowie, they desperately hoped that Reed would be the answer to all the Addicks' problems, blinded to what everyone else could see - that Reed was not cut out for being no.1 though he was no.1 in the board's hearts. In fact, Reed probably contributed to the downfall of Dowie since even though the buck stops with the manager, he needs a good backroom staff to help him implement his plans. Hence the poverty of play on the pitch was at least partly down to Reed. It soon became apparent that it was probably wholly down to Reed, despite the manful attempts of Dowie to improve Charlton. The team was simply abject under Reed, whose previous disastrous employment with the English national squad was a warning. Confidence drained away from the team, a solitary, flukey win against Blackburn the only comfort, but the board clung to him against all the odds giving him a two-year contract, hoping against hope that it would give an air of stability for the team. Then they lost to Wycombe. At home. With barely a fight. The Carling Cup semi-finals vanished in a puff of smoke and the long trudge of a relegation-haunted season alone to consider bit deep. One last chance was given for the team, that they might regain determination with only the league to focus on, but it was forlorn. And so Charlton parted company with their second manager after just over a month. Maybe the idea of opening their accounts to Les Reed with the players he might buy, struck dread into the board. A second manager was cast out, a second marriage in ruins, because the board committed too soon after the first one to Dowie. They could not find anyone who could replace their one true love that was Curbs.
And now Pardew is at The Valley to put a comforting arm round the club, to give it a shoulder to weep on. Pards was the board's original choice to succeed Curbs in the summer, but he had just signed a new four-year contract with West Ham. So thwarted, desperately looking for a man to lead them, they dishonourably shacked up with Dowie, after Palace had released him from his contract so he could spend time with his family in the north of England. As with star-crossed lovers, Pards and Chalrton eventually found themselves in each others arms but too late to avoid tragedy. Pardew will improve the team and by a scheduling quirk, he has an extra day to ready his boys against Fulham's consistent over-achievers. But Charlton is doomed, too far adrift of safety to achieve anything but a valiant fight. Added to that, Pardew has almost no money to spend in the transfer window (interestlingly, the transfer window is often held up as giving greater managerial security, but it proved the opposite in Reed's case), since Dowie blew it all the last window. Charlton were always a well-run club, regularly in the black, but they took Dowie's gamble, pushed their chips on the red and lost. Before Pardew took over, there were rumours flying around that he would. I always thought he was better off out of it and I still think so, since to have a relegation blot on your CV is damaging for an aspiring England manager and if West Ham go down as well, Pardew will be the first Premiership manager to relegate two clubs in one season and only the second in top-flight history. He may come to regret abandoning that holiday he had planned with his family for January.