Merry Christmas, Charlton

West Ham, eager to muck up the managers plans by buying expensive Argentines that aren't in the managers plans, were impatient with the performance of Pardew this year. They axed him and soon hired ex-Charlton manager Alan Curbishbley. To be blunt, I don't get it. Pardew was a good manager with a team that was struggling to deal with a sophomore slump compounded by the suits throwing the wrong players at them (Tevez and Mascherano). Curbishley still faces those same problems with the winter window unlikely to save him from the poorly dubbed "Tevezcherano". Will he change the clubs fortunes? Probably but they couldn't get much worse than they were. Short of giving Watford competition, Cursh's reign this year was bound to look good. And by no means does that mean I don't think highly of him. He may be a better manager than Pardew. However in the grand scheme of things for West Ham, it was another case of change for the sake of change instead of doing so when things truly needed to be changed and there was truly an opportunity to improve the club. Speaking of Pardew and Charlton, the soap opera takes an interesting twist. As you probably already know, Pardew's been named the new manager and will make his first appearance at The Valley on Wednesday against Fulham. It's good to see Charlton stumble into this one. I thought Dowie should have stuck around longer both because he needed more time to turn the team around and that they did not have a competent replacement lined up. Les Reed? PAHLEEEZEEE!!! Pardew's got a tough job ahead of him. But the way Blackburn's been playing (What happened, Sparky? We were talking about you taking over at Old Trafford just 8 months ago???), Sheffield Utd's lack of overall quality, the mess Gibson's turned Boro into, and Pearce's inability to get a decent Citeh squad to perform mean that Pardew has a good chance of turning things around enough to get the Addicks out of this mess. If Pardew is to save Charlton from relegation, he'll need some fresh blood. Addick's Prem Diary is reporting that Charlton is on the verge of landing Alan Smith on Loan. That would be a good first step in shaking things up there. The question is why is SAF letting Smith out on loan? Did that nasty injury really impact his game that much?