‘We’ve done nothing yet’ – Johnnie Jackson demanding more from Charlton Athletic’s players despite impressive start to caretaker spell in charge
Johnnie Jackson has challenged his Charlton Athletic side to maintain their work ethic after a flawless start to his caretaker managerial regime.
The Addicks followed up a 1-0 victory at Sunderland with a 4-0 dismantling of a poor Doncaster Rovers side.
Charlton’s poor start to the campaign cost Nigel Adkins his job and since then the energy levels of the South Londoners have been greatly improved.
Asked why the same group could not deliver the same kind of results for their old boss, Jackson replied: “I would say I don’t want to dwell on it because it is done – it’s out of the way – there is nothing we can do. I don’t want to dwell on why. My focus is on that we’re capable of that [work ethic] and you’ve shown it now. Now your challenge is do you dip off of that, and go back to how it was? Or you’ve set a standard and you maintain it.
“There is no time to dwell on what’s gone wrong or ifs and buts….I learned a lot in that time and I saw a lot of things that I felt we needed to work on. I’m just trying to implement that.”
Charlton climbed out of the League One drop zone on goal difference.
“That’s good,” said Jackson. “I’ve not even seen any results or looked at the table. Listen, if we pick up results then we’ll climb the table pretty quickly. We know that happens.
“Psychologically for the lads it’s brilliant for them to see we’re out of the bottom four – we don’t want to be there and we shouldn’t be anywhere near it – but we’re there on merit, because the performances and results haven’t been there up until now.
“Six points from two games catapults you out if it. Now we need to start looking upwards. We’ve got a tough, tough game on Tuesday night, Rotherham are a good team.”
Jackson has been given no timescale yet by Charlton owner Thomas Sandgaard over how long a judgement will take on whether he could land the manager’s job on a full-time basis.
“I really enjoy it. I’ve made no secrets of my ambitions. It’s an exciting challenge for me. It’s gone well up until now. I’m well aware there will be bumps in the road along the way but I’ve got confidence in myself, Euelly and the boys around us that we can get a tune out of the boys. We’ve shown that up until now. The challenge is maintaining it – because we’ve done nothing yet. We have to kick on up the league and see where it takes us.”
PICTURE: PAUL EDWARDS/KEITH GILLARD
