Johnnie Jackson is hoping to build on his side's recent home performances as he looks to get the Addicks back to winning ways against Fleetwood Town on Saturday.
Charlton fell to defeat in the FA Cup to Premier League side Norwich City last time out at The Valley, despite an impressive performance, while the last league outing in SE7 resulted in a narrow defeat to Wycombe Wanderers, again despite an encouraging showing.
But an impressive run of form on home turf prior to the turn of the year has given Jackson encouragement ahead of the visit of Fleetwood with another vociferous Valley crowd set to get behind the Addicks.
"Our home form is good," he explained.
"Even the defeat against Wycombe was a good performance on the day, we just couldn't get those final touches, so I'm really happy with how things are going at home, the Norwich game in the cup was another really good performance that we couldn’t turn into a win.
"Obviously I cant keep saying that but I have been encouraged by the way we’ve been going about our business and Saturday will be no different, we’ll be attacking it on our home patch and we’ll be expecting to take the game to our opposition, it’s a game we will be looking at and hoping that we get three points, it is a great opportunity for us."
On Saturday's opponents, he said: “They’re a good side - the new manager has got a little bit of a tune out of them, playing a slightly different way to the way they were before but I am really confident that my team will turn up and play the way we can, especially at home."
Meanwhile, Jackson provided a fitness update on Sam Lavelle, who gained more minutes for the U23s on Tuesday, Conor Washington, who was forced to sit out of last weekend's trip to Cheltenham Town and Jayden Stockley.
“Sam went and got 70 minutes for the 23s which is really pleasing, he came through unscathed," he said.
"He still needs to build up his match minutes and his training, he was out for a long time so he is not at the level that he was and that will take time whether that is more minutes in the 23s or dipping in and out of first-team action but obviously that's difficult in the nature of his position, we’ll continue to be smart with how we build him up to where we want but he’s fine, he’s came through everything, hit every marker and he is feeling good.
“We are continuing to monitor Conor, we don’t believe it is a serious issue and we hope to have him back real soon, hopefully for the weekend if not the Hartlepool game.
"Jayden is a little bit longer, he is improving but again one we need to monitor really closely. It’s disappointing because when those two play together up there we don't tend to lose many games, certainly under my regime we haven't lost any when they play together.
"They have been a big loss for us, we can’t lose sight of that but when they're not around we have to find another way and we are finding that a bit difficult. Bringing in Chuks will definitely help with that and if we can get everyone fit then we have got a real fighting chance, we have got some real top quality at that end of the pitch. We have been without a lot of them for a number of games so it has been difficult."
(Transcription by Alex Forrest)
