The Valley Saturday 17th December 2022
Charlton Athletic 1
Inniss (20)
Bristol Rovers 2
Marquis (61 & 72)
Referee: Sam Allison Attendance: 12,340
Much was made, before the game, of the fact that Rovers had not won an away game against Charlton Athletic for 64 years.
There was probably not a better time to play them given the fact that they recently sacked their manager, former Rovers boss Ben Garner. They were also in financial difficulties and hadn’t won in any of their last six games.
Following a midweek injury scare, Aaron Collins was declared fit enough to maintain his record of starting every Rovers league game to date, though there was bad news concerning the other midweek injury victim Jordan Rossiter who is likely to be sidelined for up to ten weeks.
Rossiter’s absence saw the manager hand a start to Luke McCormick, desperate to build on an impressive cup performance against MK Dons in midweek and desperate, also, to get back to playing as he did during his first spell with the club.
Three pitch inspections were needed before the pitch was declared fit for purpose. On Friday at 4.30pm and at 10.00am and again at 12.30pm on Saturday, though Rovers fans were, of course, well on their way to the game by then. Had it been called off at that late hour there surely would have been repercussions!
To say that Rovers were out of the blocks slowly would be some understatement, for Charlton would have been out of sight in the opening 18 minutes were it not for the brilliance of goalkeeper James Belshaw, who made four outstanding saves in that time.
The shot stopper denied Jes Rak-Sakyi in the fourth minute, collided with the post when keeping out Jayden Stockley’s effort three minutes later, saved another Rak Sakyi effort with his legs and then produced a third save from the same player.
He was beaten on 20 minutes, though, when from a corner on the left giant defender Ryan Inniss saw his looping header evade everyone and end up in the roof of the net.
Rovers could muster only two first half efforts, both from Antony Evans. The first produced a routine save from Ashley Maynard-Brewer, the second flew over the crossbar and they were fortunate to reach half time trailing by just the one goal.
Luca Hoole replaced James Connolly at the start of the second half and we later discovered that Connolly had been ill before the match. That meant a change of shape to a flat back four and there was another change on 55 minutes when John Marquis came on for the largely ineffective McCormick.
With Marquis partnering Josh Coburn and Collins given a free role just behind them, Rovers took control of proceedings. Former Millwall player Marquis, booed by Charlton fans when entering the fray, dispossessed goalscorer Inniss on 61 minutes and ran on to fire the equaliser past Maynard-Brewer.
With 72 minutes on the clock a poor clearance by Inniss was headed into the path of Marquis by skipper Paul Coutts and the inform striker took great satisfaction in hammering the ball past Maynard-Brewer to register his second double of the week.
There was no way back for the home side against a resurgent Rovers who won this proverbial game of two halves!
Charlton Athletic: Maynard-Brewer, Clare, Lavelle, Inniss, Sessegnon (Chin, 80), Payne, Dobson, Fraser (Kirk, 88), Blackett-Taylor (Morgan, 80), Stockley (Aneke, 65), Rak-Sakyi (Leaburn, 65).
Substitutes: Harness, Mitchell.
Bristol Rovers: Belshaw, Thomas, Connolly (Hoole, 46), Gibson, Sinclair (Whelan, 82), Evans, Coutts, McCormick (Marquis, 55), Gordon, Coburn, Collins (Gibbons 90+1).
Substitutes: Jaakkola, Kilgour, Saunders.
ALSO
There were no former Rovers players in the Charlton Athletic side
Yellow cards were issued to Antony Evans and Paul Coutts
Coutts was skipper
Four substitutes used
Six added minutes
(photos courtesy of JMP)
Keith Brookman