Charlton Athletic can reach Birmingham City & Wrexham levels with big off-field call | OneFootball

FLW's Charlton Athletic Fan Pundit has urged the club to bring in a new face in the boardroom to take the Addicks to the next level.

Charlton Athletic have come on leaps and bounds in the last few years, with their position both on and off the pitch now incredibly stronger than it was a little while ago, and supporters have great pride in their club once again.

The Addicks are still fighting for their Championship survival, but they do have a gap to the bottom three right now following Leicester City's point deduction earlier this year. With under a quarter of the season to go, they are in an excellent position to retain their second tier status following promotion from League One in 2024/25.

The South-East London outfit were taken over by Global Football Partners (SE7 Partners) in June 2023, and they have become a much more stable unit since then. While they started their ownership with disappointing results on the pitch, they have made significant decisions that have helped them turn the corner at The Valley.

Arguably, the most vital of those was the arrival of Nathan Jones as Charlton's head coach, with the former Southampton boss taking the club out of relegation danger in League One to promotion in the space of a year-and-a-half. However, there is perhaps one more issue that needs to be sorted at the club right now.

Charlton Athletic told they must do one thing in the boardroom to help compete at the top

While there is no denying that the Addicks are in a much stronger position right now than they were in the past, the next challenge is to take the next step and start climbing the Championship table. However, to help do that, work needs to be done behind the scenes.

Football League World has asked their Charlton Fan Pundit, Chris Woodward, what the one thing that needs to change off the pitch to help the club is. He said: "I'm a massive fan of our ownership group and genuinely think with the way the club is being run, there is nothing major hindering our ability to progress forwards. If I had to be critical, I think we do need to appoint a proper CEO.

"We do have someone handling those responsibilities at present and they are a massive Charlton fan which is positive, but it's not their area of expertise. In today's game, money dominates the industry and the more you have, the quicker and easier you can progress, in most cases shown by the likes of Birmingham and Wrexham."

Chris concluded: "A proper CEO coming in would focus on our commercial and investment opportunities to help us maximise our revenue and increase our financial support. This would allow more money to be invested in the club to get us towards a more competitive budget and compete with other teams at this level."

Charlton Athletic did have a new CEO in the summer, but the situation changed

While Chris has stated his desire for a new CEO at The Valley, it is a position that was filled at one point in the summer.

Dane Murphy, who had been the CEO at both Barnsley and Nottingham Forest previously, was announced to take on the role at Charlton on 10 June 2025. However, just over a month later, the decision was reversed and he never took on that responsibility in SE7.

The Addicks have still not filled that vacancy properly, and perhaps this is the missing link in their rise back up to the top flight of English football.

Nonetheless, the situation on the pitch is the most vital one for those at The Valley right now, and securing Championship football for another year is crucial to Charlton's plan to start building once again.