Matthew's Hornets hope

Charlton's development coach Damian Matthew will be glued to the weather reports as his side aim to finally compete in an away game on Saturday - against Watford (11am).

Ben Davisson scored a good individual goal to level matters against Fulham

Should the Addicks U18s take to the field at the home of their Hornets counterparts a whopping 96 day barren spell will finally come to an end.

Having seen their scheduled trip to Norwich City a fortnight ago postponed due to a waterlogged pitch, the young Addicks have only played on home turf since their trip to Ipswich Town on December 5th.

Since that time, matches at West Ham United and Portsmouth have also fallen foul of the adverse weather but Matthew is hoping his in-form side, which came from behind to win 2-1 against Fulham on Saturday, can finally break their away shackles.

"It's been a long time and let's hope we travel well," said Damian, who saw many of his youngsters play in a 2-2 friendly draw against a Swedish side on Tuesday. "I've not checked the weather forecast yet, but fingers crossed the game will be on!"

Some three months and eight days since that Ipswich trip, Charlton head to Hertfordshire unbeaten in 2010 and Matthew was pleased at his side's response to falling a goal behind against the Cottagers.

He said: "Fulham played a few over-age players and one of them, their centre-forward, gave us a few problems early on. We'd made a few changes to our team and weren't playing with that cohesion in the early stages, but once we got to grips with everything we played very well.

"Jordan Anderson will be disappointed at the way he went to ground to concede the penalty, but we started the second half brightly and started to dominate the game. Ben Davisson scored a good individual goal to level matters and then Tosan Popo got us a deserved winner at the end."

Midfielder Davisson had made his first start of the campaign following a fractured ankle sustained in pre-season while top-scorer Lewis Perkins also returned to the starting line-up.

Charlton suffered a 3-0 loss to Watford at Sparrows Lane the last time the sides met, in April last year, and Matthew and his side were looking forward to the task at hand.

"We've had a good week's training, and a lot were involved in the reserve team game on Tuesday," he said. "As ever we're look forward to going down to a nice environment at Watford. The pitches are always decent over there and there are good facilities. It will be a good test for us."

Charlton's postponed game at Norwich will now be played on Wednesday, April 14th, with a 1pm kick-off.