The sale of Charlton Athletic in September 2020 was meant to bring about the end of years of bad management, but that definitely hasn’t been the case.
It’s been said more about this one club than most of their ‘rivals’, but the arrival of a new owner in September 2020 was supposed to herald the beginning of a new era for Charlton Athletic.
Thomas Sandgaard ended a nine-month spell during which the club was kicked from pillar to post after former owners East Street Investments – who themselves came to The Valley after detested former owner Roland Duchatelet just a few months earlier – collapsed around the club’s ears.
With Charlton relegated from the Championship at the end of the 2019/20 season, a very public falling-out between former majority shareholder Tahnoon Nimer and executive chairman Matt Southall led to Paul Elliott purchasing ESI in June 2020. But after a number of individuals failed the EFL’s Owners’ and Directors’ Test, the club had to be put back up for sale again, with a rumour circulating that they may even be expelled from the EFL if a transfer of ownership was not successfully completed.
As such, the arrival of Sandgaard felt like something of a breath of fresh air, but any hopes that the club could just get back to the business of operating normally have proved somewhat premature. Sandgaard tried and failed to reunite the club with ownership of its stadium and training ground – both still owned by Duchatelet – while the team continued to stagnate on the pitch, finishing just below the League One play-off places at the end of the 2020/21 season.
And off the pitch, the eyebrow-raising moments started to escalate. In August 2021, Sandgaard took the unusual step of releasing what he described as a ‘fight song’ for the club called ‘Addicks To Victory’, which was subsequently released onto Apple Music and Spotify. Those who want to hear it and feel that they can do so without cringing themselves inside-out can do so here.
Such a venture could be dismissed as harmless eccentricity in splendid isolation, but this hasn’t really been possible. In December 2021, it was confirmed that Sandgaard’s son had been given a job as the club’s director of analytics despite a perceived lack of qualifications for the position, while it was also rumoured that staff found themselves often dealing with Raelynn Maloney, Sandgaard’s American girlfriend. According to reports from the Evening Standard:
‘Some working…
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