Charlton Athletic fix sent to Nathan Jones amid 'really weird' situation - it's came 'out of absolutely nowhere' | OneFootball

The Addicks have conceded eight goals in their last two Championship games, but what can be done to fix this problem?

This article is part of Football League World's 'Terrace Talk' series, which provides personal opinions from our FLW Fan Pundits regarding the latest breaking news, teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…

Despite making a positive start on their return to the Championship, Charlton Athletic have suffered two heavy back-to-back defeats.

Since their last-gasp victory over West Brom at the beginning of November, the Addicks have lost three games on the spin, starting off with a 1-0 defeat away at Wrexham.

But in the last two games, Charlton have been conceding goals at an alarming rate, suffering a shock 5-1 defeat at home to Southampton, while Nathan Jones’ men went down 3-0 to Stoke City in midweek, which saw his side concede two goals in the opening five minutes of the match.

This means Charlton have lost two games on a combined aggregate score of 8-1, leaving the Addicks faithful scratching their heads as to why this has so suddenly come about.

Despite their three points over the Baggies, it does mean Charlton have only won once out of their last five second-tier outings, with the club needing to get out of this slump quickly if they are to draw themselves back into the promotion conversation.

With this in mind, FLW’s Charlton Athletic fan pundit has offered his thoughts on where it’s gone so wrong recently and what needs to be changed in order to fix it.

Midfield issue raised as the reason for Charlton Athletic slump

Speaking to Football League World, Charlton Athletic fan pundit Alfie believes leaving Conor Coventry isolated in midfield has allowed opposition teams to hurt the Addicks in open spaces, leading to their influx of conceding goals in the last two Championship games.

Alfie said: “It’s been a really weird last couple of games, out of nowhere, out of absolutely nowhere. I think everybody was really happy with where the team was going, everybody is still happy, myself included, I’m still happy, as in the long-run, I think we’ll be OK, and we’ve shown enough, but it’s been a really strange couple of weeks, especially that Southampton game, at home, all feeling pretty optimistic, but we got absolutely torn apart.

“I think part of it, and people won’t like to hear this, is that Southampton showed some real quality, and with the Stoke game that followed, we’re talking about two freak goals, not that’s not an excuse, but it’s not quite as cut and dry as ‘Charlton are rubbish’, those two things are factors, those freak goals from Stoke and moments of quality from Southampton to punish us.

“The main thing that sticks out about where it’s going wrong is our midfield is being bypassed to a ridiculous extent.

"The amount of times in the last two games we’ve seen players bombing through, sprinting at full pace towards our penalty box because they’ve had a massive run at our backline with nobody in the middle to stop them has been very strange. It feels like (Conor) Coventry has been left alone as some kind of shield as a single pivot and that’s not going to work when you’ve got two to three players running at you at once.

“I don’t really know where that’s come from. I do think we’re suffering a lot due to injuries as well. We’ve got a lot of players out, we’re losing a lot of defenders to injury, so these are all factors.

“It’s difficult to put my finger on where it exactly is. Against Southampton, we were half-hearted in our press. We had players kind of pressing, committed a lot of bodies forward to this half press, and from that, Southampton could build from the back very easily, and because so many bodies were forward, they could do one long-range pass into the midfield, and suddenly they’ve got a free run at our backline.

“In the Stoke game, I think it was bad, but we were victims to a couple of freak goals. When it rains, it definitely pours, and when things aren’t going for you, nothing is going for you. It does feel that way at the moment with us.”

However, Alfie does believe Nathan Jones can find a solution to the problem, believing Stoke City and Southampton fans shouldn’t be goading Charlton too much over Jones as a manager for their past couple of performances.

Alfie added: “I don’t quite know what the answer is, but I’ve got faith Nathan Jones does know what the answer is. I think everyone who is chanting and making fun of him right now, there’s a lot of that going on from both the Stoke and Southampton fans, I’d be careful, because Jones is the type of manager who takes it very personally, and he usually gets the last laugh.

“So I’ve got a lot of faith that he can turn it around. However, I’d be surprised if we turned it around against Coventry away, but we’ll see.”

Charlton Athletic must get back to basics to stifle Coventry City

Given Charlton Athletic’s recent run of letting up goals, a visit to the CBS Arena to take on Coventry City would have been the last thing they wanted given the Sky Blues’ habit of blowing teams away so far this season.

Frank Lampard’s men lead the way by a country mile in goals scored by netting 47 times so far this term, scoring a combined seven strikes in their last two victories over West Brom and Middlesbrough.

Over the last six games, Charlton boss Nathan Jones has elected to play a 3-1-4-2 formation, but tweaking to that setup has only seen the side claim one win in their last six, so it does appear it may be the time to bolster out the midfield and give Conor Coventry some added support.

The last time Charlton had a convincing win in the Championship was a 3-0 victory over Blackburn Rovers at the end of September when playing a 4-3-3 system, but the likes of Charlie Kelman and Joe Edwards are on the sidelines through injury that played their part in that game.

Right now, Charlton have been far too open, and it’s up to Jones to change it to see a turn in results and to get themselves back up the table.

At the forefront of his mind should be switching to a back four, with a three at the back formation stuttering Charlton’s early momentum that they created.