Dean Keates: Charlton defeat sums up Walsall's season

Over the course of the 90 minutes, the Saddlers proved more than a match for an Addicks outfit chasing automatic promotion.

But individual errors saw them gift two goals to Lee Bowyer's side in the first eight minutes.

For the opener, Morgan Ferrier sloppily gave away possession in his own half.

Then just moments later, Jack Fitzwater was deemed to have fouled Lyle Taylor who converted from the penalty spot.

Walsall went on to pull a goal back through Andy Cook and they then dominated the second half on New Years Day. But they were unable to fully recover from their dreadful start.

"It's the story of the season," Keates said.

"There is no doubt about it, that game sums us up.

"To be fair to the lads they have said it themselves. We need to wake up because we are costing ourselves.

"We don’t seem to have a problem when we are playing against the top six or seven teams - we have contested every game.

"But we are not helping ourselves. We can’t keep giving away silly goals and making mistakes the way we are.

“It’s sloppiness and two individual errors that cost us.”

Keates hailed his players performance in the second half but admitted they were never likely to win the game after finding themselves two goals behind.

"We have not given ourselves an opportunity to win the football match," the manager continued.

"You can’t go into a game of football like that. A sloppy pass in the middle of the park has gone straight through us.

"And then we let the ball bounce in the middle of the box and end up conceding a penalty on the back of it because we are making recovery runs into the box.

"Second half we were camped in their half, I thought we were outstanding after the break.

"We kept going, played some good stuff and moved them around.

"But we let the opposition get easy goals and we don’t get that."