CHARLTON manager Michael Appleton believes his side would have gone on to wrap up all three points had today’s game at high-flying continued.
Appleton was ultimately forced to settle for a share of the spoils on his Addicks managerial debut after Corey Blackett-Taylor’s successful penalty conversion two minutes into added time cancelled out Jamie Reid’s first half opener.
There was still another 10 minutes additional time played once Blackett-Taylor did the honours from 12 yards and the new boss just wished that leveller had come even earlier.
He told Charlton TV: “Once we got that equaliser, for me there was only going to be one winner. We were just unfortunate we didn’t get the opportunity to do it.
“We almost forget Stevenage were top of the league (before 3pm) so they are obviously doing something right.
“They are making themselves really, really difficult to beat so we have to be reasonably positive.
“There is a good feeling in the dressing room because in those situations it is easy when you are a little bit low in confidence to go down and get turned over and they never allowed that to happen.”
Blackett-Taylor’s spot-kick was his first of the season and was enough to knock Stevenage off their League One perch and down to fourth spot in League One.
Appleton said: “It was a cool finish but I think he had quite a quiet game today.
“For him to have the courage and discipline to know what he is doing, pick his spot and obviously in front of the fans as well, there was a lot of pressure on him.
“He kept a cool head and it was a good finish.”
Chuks Aneke made his first appearance of the campaign when he was introduced as a 76th minute substitute for Miles Leaburn.
And Appleton was delighted to see his hard work at Sparrows Lane pay off with an impressive late cameo from the bench despite some understandable concerns about Aneke’s fitness.
He said: “I’ve been absolutely delighted with Chuks the way he has trained this week.
“I felt I might have had to pull him out of some of the sessions we’ve had because that was one of the things I was worried (about).
“We’ve trained hard this week and I’ve really upped the intensity in training.
“I know the sports scientists are telling me the load is more than what the lads are used to, but my answer back to that is, ‘If we want to win games and compete at the top end of this table, we have to do that’.
“I think we were the ones coming really strong towards the end of the game and I reckon we could have played for another 10/15 minutes and hopefully got our joy then.”
Despite feeling aggrieved his side didn’t go on to win the game, Appleton still drew plenty of positives from the display at Stevenage.
He added: “We came here genuinely wanting the three points, regardless of what has happened so far this season.
“We got the one, we got a reaction in the second half, we got a much better performance and hopefully the fans can see moving forward that we can get many more of those type of performances.”
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