Schumacher's Charlton Preview

Argyle boss Steven Schumacher was delighted with how his side played on Saturday, winning 2-0 at Home Park against Peterborough – but now the task is to repeat that magic.

Just three days following the win over The Posh, Argyle head to The Valley to meet Charlton Athletic, looking to perform to the same high standards.

Reflecting on the Peterborough win, Schumacher said: “If you could bottle that type of performance up and bring it out every time we played it would be great, wouldn’t it?

“It was a really good display from everyone. It was hard to single anybody out. Everyone put a massive amount of work in and got a reward from it.

“But that is going to be what is required to get any points in this division. You can’t drop your standards. The energy has to be at that level for every single game if you want to get points. We’ll be looking to do that on Tuesday.”

Charlton have a win, a draw and a defeat from their opening trio of games in Sky Bet League One, their first under new manager Ben Garner, who took over in the summer following an impressive season as Swindon Town boss.

The Addicks finished 13th in League One last season under Johnnie Jackson, before he departed as manager and was replaced by Garner.

“A new manager has gone in there, he did really well last year with Swindon” said Schumacher. “We played Swindon in the Papa John’s and they played some good football.

“Charlton have got loads of good movement in their shape, and how they rotate. They’ve got really good players. We looked at Charlton’s squad last season, and said they had one of the strongest squads in League One. They just didn’t get going for whatever reason.

“They’ve still got the majority of that squad, and they’ve recruited well, added some better players. They are a really good side, have played some nice football in their first few games, and were unlucky on Saturday. It’s going to be a tough one.”

Last season, almost 3,000 members of the Green Army headed to The Valley one Saturday in November, with The Pilgrims top of the league and unbeaten in 16 games. That run came to an end with a 2-0 loss to Charlton, but Schumacher is hoping that Argyle’s travelling fans will head home happier this time around.

“We lost the game last year at The Valley, and it stopped our run,” he said. “I remember coming away so disappointed because we didn’t give the fans something to cheer, and there was so many of them. We worked hard, it was really close and it was decided on set plays.

“Hopefully we’ll give all our fans who have travelled to The Valley something to celebrate this year.”