Charlton Athletic beat Middlesbrough 2-0 on Sunday, but the win wasn’t enough to pull them out of the relegation zone in the Championship, nor did it change the feelings of supporters on the current state of the club.
Resentment against owner Roland Duchatelet, who bought Charlton in January 2014, and chief executive Katrien Meire has been growing rapidly as they’ve gone through six managers in two years and results have suffered along with the quality of the squad. This inspired fans to hold a mock funeral procession for “the spirit of the club” before the Middlesbrough match.
Charlton ‘extremely saddened’ as fans protest with funeral and by throwing balls on pitchhttps://t.co/plfgJhXueA pic.twitter.com/XUi2Xhzbwk
— Mirror Football (@MirrorFootball) March 13, 2016
During the match, they threw beach balls onto the pitch and chanted “We want Roland out” to the bemusement of Meire, who watched from the director’s box.
As recently as December, Duchatelet said he would not sell the club. But if Charlton are relegated to League One, these demonstrations will likely continue as anger rises.
Here’s fan footage of all the day’s protests…
It is puzzling to me that the Charlton players failed to make the most of the opportunity to clear the field of the beach balls and build skills simultaneously. To leave this task to stewards is shameful, and Charlton deserve relegation as a result.
North Korean flag in the first video, nice.