Charlton surrendered their unbeaten record to Stevenage in leafy Hertfirdshire on Saturday. Chris Powell had some interesting post match thoughts.

Powell tinkered with his back line for the first time this season, dropping Chris Solly, moving Michael Morrison to right-back with Leon Cort replacing Morrison as Matt Taylor’s partner.

The dropping of Solly – one of the better players in recent weeks – raised a few eyebrows. Chris explained it like this:

“It was a bit tactical, he’s (Solly) been one of my best players and it’s hard to do something like that.

“Stevenage are a very physical and big side, so I made the change. That happens, and I’m going to do that when I feel I need to make a change for certain games.

“I’m sure Chris will be fine and he will come back. He’s my number one right-back, that’s for certain. I just felt I needed to make that change.”

Solly’s lack of height has been targeted by opponents in the past but though Morrison has played at right-back before, he is clearly a central defender who can fill in and nothing more. Simon Francis is a genuine full-back, has height and can overlap and deliver crosses as well, a useful asset on an afternoon when Danny Green was quiet.

Francis has his critics and seems out of favour with his manager but if he was brought in the parnership between Taylor and Morrison could have been left in place.

The problem Powell now has is that Leon Cort was arguably Charlton’s man of the match, so does he drop him, stick to the back-four used at Stevenage or restore Solly to right-back? He has given himself a problem that could have been avoided.

Chris continued:

“Leon did well. He’s an experienced campaigner and he won his headers defensively and made some good blocks and decisions.

“He’s just come back from World Cup duty so it was tough call to put him in and leave Chris out. I’m very happy with what he did today,” said Chris, before talking about goal scorer, Stacy Long, a player who was at The Valley during Powell’s playing days, “He was a good player, but it never happened for him. He moved on and has made a nice career for himself.

“He’s had a shot it and it hit Harrison and there was nothing Ben (Hamer) could do about it.

“It is a shame that in the last two games we have conceded two deflected goals and, before that, two penalties.

“It’s quite hard to take when you look at it, because in the main we have defended and stood up to opponents. They were a tough proposition and we stood up to it,” said the manager.

Many will feel that the Addicks should have been looking to do a bit more than ‘stand up’ to Tranmere and Stevenage. With all due respect to those two clubs, they are not going to be in the promotion shake up at the end of the season and many teams will adopt their strategy when playing Charlton. To gain promotion, the Addicks will have to overcome these challenges.

Powell concluded by denying that the loss of the unbeaten record could be a blessing in disguise:

“No, no, no, no. You don’t want to lose a game, you want the run to continue. If you ask that to Lee Clark at Huddersfield Town, he would say you want that to continue, and I’m no different.

“I wanted our run to go on. It’s not a monkey off our back – not at all. You want to carry on and keep producing positive

results because it keeps everyone upbeat and positive.

“Now we have to get our heads together and look at what we can take from today and move on to Carlisle.

“There’s a long way to go. Our good run ends and we move on.”

Good teams look to go on another run immediately after a reverse. Charlton will hope they can do that when Carlisle come calling on Saturday.