Pressure mounting, an unwanted record and more questions than answers: Matt Scrafton's verdict on Blackpool's late defeat to Charlton Athletic

While his short reign to date has been staggered over a bizarre and unprecedented seven months, Critchley now has the unenviable and unwanted honour of holding the same record.

It’s far too early to be talking of sackings, we’re only seven games into the league season after all, but the fact we’re even discussing it in the first place should set alarm bells ringing.

What this latest defeat, Blackpool’s fifth already, does do though, is set up a monumental weekend encounter with MK Dons who, like Blackpool, find themselves rooted inside League One’s bottom four.

Fail to beat Russell Martin’s side at the weekend and the real Dons away on Tuesday night and there will be real trouble on the horizon.

Knives are already being sharpened among sections of the fanbase, a quite surreal turnaround from only a month or so ago. How have things soured so quickly after all the pre-season hype and optimism, which seemed entirely justified at the time?

Given so much has been invested into the ‘Critchley way’, I don’t envisage owner Simon Sadler wielding the axe just yet. But at what point do the excuses begin to wear thin? At what point do the dismal results overshadow the hope that things will turn given sufficient time?

Even if Critchley was to be given the chop, where would Blackpool go from there? Every player brought in this summer has been done so to fit into how Critchley wants to play.

At the moment, there’s far more questions than answers.

While Critchley, in his first senior role in management, is still learning on the job and will inevitably make mistakes along the way, he’s not being helped by some of his players at the moment.

James Husband gave his team a mountain to climb once again after inexplicably being sent off after just 58 seconds of Tuesday night’s encounter.

Even if the contact was minimal, it was inexcusable to get the wrong side of Omar Bogle in the first place. In the end he gave the referee no option but to brandish a straight red, the second time he’s been on the receiving end of such a decision already this season.

Ironically, the Seasiders actually played better with a man down than they did when the referee evened it up later in the game.

They could afford to sit deep in a solid defensive block and look to utilise CJ Hamilton’s electric pace on the counter, a tactic that seemed to be working fairly effectively up until Ben Purrington’s second yellow just before the interval.

While the Addicks inevitably enjoyed the lion’s share of possession, they weren’t doing a great deal with it and Blackpool, dare I say it, looked fairly comfortable defensively.

The game well and truly back on, the second-half was a huge disappointment. In general play it looked to be an even affair, but Charlton were always the side that looked more likely to make the breakthrough.

Blackpool, as they have been guilty of on several occasions this season, enjoyed plenty of the ball in the second period but did very little with it. The lack of creativity was worrying.

Lee Bowyer’s side, on the other hand, are an experienced and efficient outfit that look to be well set up to grind out results on a regular basis this season - something that can’t be said for Blackpool at this moment in time.

Charlton squandered two or three presentable chances, Bogle the biggest culprit, before eventually forcing the ball home on 56 minutes - only for it to be disallowed, much to Pool’s relief.

The goal was ruled out after some deliberation between the official and his linesman, who somewhat belatedly raised his flag for offside following Blackpool’s passionate appeals, deeming Bogle to have added a late touch to Ryan Inniss’ towering header on the goalline.

It was a crucial moment that ought to have sprung the Seasiders into life, but instead it only seemed to spur their frustrated and angry opponents on.

With Blackpool struggling to create anything of note, the door was left open for Charlton to snatch it late on and that’s exactly what they did.

Substitute Chuks Aneke was the match-winner, the striker glancing home a well-taken header after the mightily impressive Alfie Doughty had done well to keep a deep cross alive at the back post. Demetri Mitchell, and not for the first time, was caught napping defensively.

That proved to be enough to snatch the three points, with the Seasiders unable to muster any sort of response even with the fourth official indicating a generous six minutes of added time.

I usually agree with Critchley’s post-match summaries but, for him to say there was nothing in the game and 0-0 would have been a fair result simply wasn’t true.

I counted at least six presentable opportunities for the away side, while Blackpool’s only real chance of the game fell to debutant Ben Woodburn, who blazed over when he ought to have done better.

While Blackpool produced eight shots on goal, only one of them was on target. In truth, they never looked like scoring.

On a positive note, Arsenal loanee Dan Ballard was excellent on his Blackpool debut having entered the pitch in bizarre circumstances, replacing the unfortunate Grant Ward after just three minutes following Husband’s unforgivable dismissal.

Marvin Ekpiteta also enjoyed his best display in a Blackpool shirt so far, while Ollie Turton deserves credit for battling away when the chips were down.

Apart from that, it’s not looking great, is it?