Charlton Athletic boss Lee Bowyer on crisp packet protest at The Valley
BY RICHARD CAWLEY
Lee Bowyer has admitted that his first thought when Charlton Athletic fans threw crisp packets onto the pitch today was that it was going to stop a goalscoring chance.
The Addicks broke forward almost instantly from kick-off as home supporters produced their protest at cost-cutting measures by owner Roland Duchatelet.
Charlton caretaker manager Bowyer said: “We were nearly going to score. I was thinking ‘please stop’. I thought the ref might stop [the game] and Karlan [Grant] is running in behind and we did nearly score from it in that first minute.
“Look, whatever happens off the pitch is happening. I can’t control that. I can’t control stop the fans throwing crisp packets onto the pitch. All I can control is what is happening on the pitch regarding the players. That’s what I’ll keep doing.”
Play was stopped for a couple of minutes as the crisps – provided by Coalition Against Roland Duchatelet [CARD].
Timing of crisps bad. Should have thrown when ball was dead. But that is CARD. They appear to care nearly as little as RD at times
People throwing bags had no instructions from CARD to throw bags, neither were instructions given at what time to throw crisps, which isn’t surprising as fans with crisps had no instructions to do so as far as I’m aware?