Charlton Athletic: Please read!!!!!

hi, im a student at university of southampton, and iv chosen to do an essay on the ups and downs of football popularity between 1980's and mid 1990's, basically so i can concerntatre of charltons period of exile at palace and westham. therefore, i can talk about the love cafc fans have for the valley and why they will always call it home since 1992. i would like responses from those who experienced this, and those who continued to watch the games and persued the quest to get charlton back to the Valley. How it felt to be a club without a home? how the attendence figures charnged? and why we felt it so neccessary to return to the Valley?? any other relative comments would be welcome, along with links to other sites etc. thanks. Nicky - pls help!!!!

hey. i will have a look around for links etc i dont remember it to be honest hehe.. guess thats cos am in scotland

The link below shows good pictures of different era's of the pitch, one i think will be of intrest is the one when its abondoned.

Pictures of the Valley

Valley Gold Scheme

how are you getting on with this Rufus?

its ok. the pics were helpful. trying to find reasons why football decreased in popularity in the 1980s, in specific to cafc, and then why it rose agin in the 1990s....but after todays game, not really motivated too anything!!:sport-smiley-019:

The decrease in popularity in the 80's could well be as Hooliganism was at it's highest. But i failed to notice a big decline at the bigger clubs. In the terraces at Upton Park, where i spent every saturday it couldn't have been better. The vocal support was like none other, it was always packed-out and we didn't have that bad a side lol! Going back to vocal support, this has slowly been in decline since the 80's. This i see is due to the stadiums being all seating...

It was a era of some bad times in football, the Heysel disaster, the fire at Bradford, both in 1985.. Quite a few riots in the stands at some matches aswell. During the 80's hooliganism was at it highest, they sported tattoos on their hands/arms showing their allegiance to their local football team-usually Millwall, West Ham, Leeds and England. The mid 80's saw the football yob undergo a renaissance. The more modern day hooligan could be quite easily seen dressed in a sharp suit, mobile phone and holding a regular 9-5 job.

But things started to change in the late 80's. The introduction of more foriegn based players, the grounds changing to all seating and a big crackdown on football hooligans, saw popularity on the rise again. One thing that did take a big jump from the 80's to the 90's was the television revenue, it took a massive surge.

The European ban affected crowd sizes as well.

As for the vocal support, too many prawn sandwich merchants attending football matches. I cant stand the corporate hospitality, people watching Chelski because they are in vogue, go back to whatever it is you were doing before.

Everytime you stand up your getting told to sit back down, it's taking away the enjoyment of going to games. I'm not a hooligan but I don't like clubs catering to 'families' football is a mans game which men go to watch, being told I can't say something because it might offend someone around be is rubbish.