Living next door to Charlton

I'm not a follower of football, it's a whole tide of life that used to just pass me by.

When I moved here I knew that there was a football club just down the road however I didn't think it would affect me that much.

Oh how wrong I was... Two parking tickets later (one successfully appealed, the other paid) my lesson has been learned.

People often ask me what it's like living so close to the ground. Well in all honesty it's really not that bad, you just have to remember to move your car on match days. Oh that and making sure you're not going to try to drive home just after a match. All told it's not bad at all though.

Would I do it again knowing what I know now? Well in all honesty I would view it as a negative to the place, but not that big a one and probably not big enough so as to make me want to be elsewhere.

I read a story on the News Shopper site today about how the club have been refused planning permission by the Council to build some new stands, you can read it here.

The capacity is currently about 27,000 so that's an increase of 4000 or so people through the gate. I don't think that's going to make a huge difference.

However I did wonder why this was the first I'd heard about it.

In part it's probably because I moved here just after the initial planning permission was granted.

However I do think that Charlton could be doing more to involve and inform local residents about what they're up to. True enough I've said that I don't really mind the effect they have on my little world, but it would be nice to think of them as the sort of neighbour who will pop over and let you know what they're up to just in case you are bothered about it.

They used to pop a leaflet through peoples doors giving the upcoming fixtures. However not only did that not include fixture changes and knock out things like the FA cup but they haven't bothered doing one this year.

Would it really be too much to ask them to pop a little letter through locals doors once a month giving all the upcoming dates?

I'm lucky, I'm on the net and I check their fixture web site regularly. Not everyone is though and the only other way I seem to know of finding out is the little sign at the top of Floyd Road. However that's often not updated to a few days ahead so it's not of that much use to people that don't get out much.

So they're not bad neighbours really, I'd just like to feel like they bear me in mind once in a while.