Walsall 1 v Charlton Athletic 1

I used my CAFC TV subscription for the fourth time this season to tune into the match at the Banks' Stadium. Not great value-for-money so far but I pity those of you who rely upon it when we draw the short straw and have to listen to the amateur commentary from Emma Jones. Even her BBC mugshot is crap - "nae bonnie" as my Granny would have said. At least we have the saving grace of being able to listen to the usually biased home commentary, so this evening I settled for a bloke who sounded just like Chris Hughes, the mad-professor looking one from the quiz show Eggheads.


Phil Parkinson clearly felt the need to react to the Tranmere performances and the four changes to the side told you that Basey, Semedo, Sam and Mooney were carrying the can. All were on the bench but Solly, Racon, Wagstaff and Akpo Sodje got the nod. To be fair, Mooney might have lost out to Akpo on merit and Semedo can't be too surprised to be dropped after his last couple of showings, but Lloyd Sam and Grant Basey might be feeling hard-done-by.


Nonetheless, it was a quiet opening 30 minutes with gentle rain falling throughout and a muted atmosphere with 446 Charlton fans in what we were told was a "sub-4000" (3417) crowd.  "Chris Hughes" and his co-commentator clearly knew next to nothing about the visitors. Chris wondered if the two Sodje's were related and his sidekick then explained to listeners that we had recently loaned Akpo out to Sheffield Wednesday "which was a sign of how strong our squad was!" 


Just as we began to get forward and create chances, Walsall took the lead. A cross on the run from Daryl Westlake looped over the Charlton rearguard and Troy Deeney was there to head past Robbie Elliot. Charlton came back strongly and Richards was forced to clear in a panic and hit his own post. Chris Hughes told us Walsall were lucky to get away with that and that Charlton were still dangerous. How right he was. Charlton won a corner on 45 minutes and Racon was judged by referee Haines to have been fouled in the box from the Reid-taken corner.  Deon Burton stepped up to beat Trinidadian Clayton Ince for 1-1 at half-time.


Walsall had a loud claim for a penalty shortly after the restart as Dailly challenged Byfield but there was nothing doing. Akpo Sodje was prominent in the opening twenty minutes of the second-half winning balls and forcing corners, one of which saw his header tipped over by Ince. Bailey and Reid got busy winning balls and crossing as Charlton looked to up the ante and commit men forward. McKenzie was introduced as the first sub for Akpo Sodje after 65 minutes, presumably because he was tiring as he appeared to have been playing well enough. 


The pitch was a bit of a pudding by all accounts, which I guess should be no surprise after the number of games lost to the snow and ice. It was cutting up in the second half which probably didn't help the flowing football as the game became scrappy. Walsall had suffered a number of bookings, all of which were considered unfair by the commentators. The inevitable happened towards the end as Troy Deeney walked and Walsall were reduced to ten men.


Kyel Reid fired over the bar and  Lloyd Sam came on for Scott Wagstaff with 10 minutes left as Charlton put the pressure on. Walsall had another player booked for time-wasting as Charlton forced a number of corners. Grant "Bassey" got on before the end for Chris Solly as Parky moved to assuage a couple of those he had obviously disappointed with his initial team selection. Fraser Richardson ballooned a shot over the bar in the last minute of normal time and we had five added minutes in which to try and win it. Kyel Reid had another shot blocked for a corner before the finish but we couldn't score.


So it finished 1-1 which is not good enough for automatic promotion, but with our new play-off heads on, is not a bad result. Although Colchester United came from behind to beat Carlisle 2-1. Swindon on Saturday is looking like one of our toughest games of the season so far.


Someone needs to get the Fans Forum on the case about getting shot of Emma Jones. She is a one-person sales-prevention force for CAFC TV. The stats on how many of our fans tune into the home commentary would surely prove the case. It looks like I will be relying upon a few more CAFC TV match commentaries in the second-half of the season and it shouldn't be too much to ask for someone who can do the job half-decently.