Oh for an opt out!

This evening, Phil Parkinson is forced to drag a coach-load of players across England to the market-town of Shrewsbury to play the first qualifying round of the old League Cup. In all of my years of following the Addicks, I have always wanted us to field our strongest side in every cup competition. Our relative lack of cup success in my lifetime has left me with the feeling that we are somehow less equal than most, if not all of the other clubs, certainly of those we have competed against.


If you think just of the London clubs, with the exception of Brentford, I believe all of the others have at least made a semi-final and purely in South London terms, Millwall, Palace and even old Wimbledon have gone one better. North of the river, I think all of them have won a cup barring the O's and I believe they have managed a semi. We have truly under-performed in the cup and our League Cup showing is much worse than what we have managed in the F A Cup.


Now that we are established in League One, we also face the ignomy of the having to compete from the first round which makes the prospective job of reaching a semi-final that bit more impossible. Having played on Saturday and with another important league fixture on Friday night, we need this trip like we need Iain Dowie back at the club..


Looking desperately for some positives, it is an opportunity for Parky to include some of the fringe players and use the fixture to absorb a game of the three match ban that Jose Semedo faces (unless revoked on appeal), but you can't help thinking it's all a bit of a waste of time and money. The fact that a miserly 188 tickets had been bought by Charlton fans tells you all you need to know about how unattractive this fixture is. I suspect at least half of those going are probably first-time visitors to Shrewsbury or are going because they want to add the Greenhous Meadow to their list of grounds visited. 


Using the logic that home gates less than we might attract for a Premier League friendly cost us money, we should be grateful we have been drawn away again! 


Perhaps in a couple of season time, if we are still in this division, I might revise my opinion and see it as the best chance we have in cup competitions of a bigger-club scalp by beating one of their lesser formations. In the meantime,  I believe we should be given an opt out so we can avoid the need to field a weakened side and hope to slip out of the competition by the odd-goal to save face.