Charlton Athletic once struck Crystal Palace gold - Addicks may struggle to believe fresh Selhurst Park news | OneFootball

Charlton Athletic supporters may be surprised by Jesurun Rak-Sakyi's latest move away from Crystal Palace

Charlton Athletic are now back in the Championship after defeating Leyton Orient in the League One play-off final at Wembley in May, but a compelling argument remains that the finest player to pull on Addicks red at the Valley in recent history strutted his stuff during the club's third-tier residency.

The South London outfit spent five years in League One, suffering relegation from the Championship at the first attempt of survival at the end of the 2019/20 campaign before, of course, returning to English football's second-tier earlier this year.

Remarkably, last season represented the first in which Charlton had finished in League One's top-six since they gambled successfully on the lottery of the play-offs to deny Sunderland an instant Championship return all the way back in 2019, with the Addicks enduring a mixed spell and holding mixed memories of life in tier three.

The 2022/23 season was no exception, where Charlton's fortunes were inconsistent. A 10th-placed finish during a season in which the Addicks had two separate managers in charge was little to shout about, of course, but they did make it to an EFL Cup quarter-final tie against Manchester United and were offered great joy and respite by the electrifying performances of Jesurun Rak-Sakyi.

Charlton Athletic struck Crystal Palace transfer gold with Jesurun Rak-Sakyi loan swoop

That year, seemingly everything positive appeared to flow through the influential Rak-Sakyi, who resembled anything but a player embarking upon his first foray in senior football on loan from Crystal Palace by exerting a consistently standout impact for Charlton.

Charlton's Jesurun Rak-Sakyi battles for the ball against Manchester United.

Initially schooled at Chelsea, the winger arrived with an exciting reputation from an encouraging body of work with Palace's academy but defied expectation to establish himself among League One's finest attacking operators.

Aged just 20 for much of the campaign, Rak-Sakyi finished it with 15 goals and eight assists in league action.

The former England youth international married his explosive speed and trickery on the right flank with maturity and composure infront of goal beyond his years and was a talismanic figure for Dean Holden's side, finishing as the Addicks' leading goalscorer by usurping Miles Leaburn's impressive 12-goal haul.

Bigger and better things, then, were rightfully expected of Rak-Sakyi and while he has gone on to achieve exactly that, those who cheered on his blistering impact at the Valley that year may just be left wondering how much more is yet to come, and will certainly be left feeling no shortage of surprise at his latest move away from Selhurst Park.

Jesurun Rak-Sakyi's Rizespor move will be big Charlton Athletic shock

Instead of following the expected course of heading out to a Championship side on loan after his stunning spell in South London with Charlton, Rak-Sakyi would spend a year warming the bench at Palace, where he made only a handful of cameo appearances before getting his second-tier move a year on in the form of a temporary switch to Sheffield United.

Rak-Sakyi's season at Bramall Lane was mixed, as he scored on seven occasions but fell short of establishing himself as a nailed-on starter under Chris Wilder or truly lighting up the Championship, both of which had been eagerly expected by the masses.

Nonetheless, Rak-Sakyi was, once again, not short of suitors after a respectable campaign and Southampton and Swansea City both expressed an interest — but to no avail.

Instead, on Türkiye's transfer deadline day, the 22-year-old completed a shock loan move to Caykur Rizespor, who finished ninth out of 19 teams during the previous Süper Lig season. From the outside looking in, it does feel like something of a desperate move, with domestic and other continental windows having already closed before Rak-Sakyi put pen to paper on a season-long stint in Türkiye.

Indeed, one must wonder why Palace opted against either cashing in on his services or sanctioning a second successive switch to the Championship, a move which would have enabled him to continue acclimating to the division and be monitored at close quarters by the Eagles.

Charlton, in particular, may be more confused than most, having seen firsthand just how promising Rak-Sakyi was and still is, with much resting on this season for the Englishman to now reignite that potential and display to the footballing world what the Addicks saw two years ago.