Lyndon Dykes on his Charlton Athletic contract status and SE7 switch working out to absolute perfection with game minutes Scottish international craved
Lyndon Dykes has described his move to Charlton Athletic as being “absolutely amazing” in terms of the boxes he wanted to tick after his Birmingham City contract was ripped up in January.
The 30-year-old striker joined the Addicks with the aim of greatly increasing his minutes for the second half of the Championship season and cementing his place in Scotland’s squad for this summer’s World Cup finals in the USA.
Dykes has started 13 of the 15 matches he has been available for since arriving in south-east London - coming on in the other two. He was also set to start at Oxford United last month but dropped out in the warm-up due to illness.
Lyndon Dykes celebrates his goal against Bristol City on Good Friday/Picture: Keith Gillard
Dykes has scored three league goals for Charlton - as many as he got in 46 league matches for Birmingham City. Thirty-five of those appearances for the Blues were as a substitute.
The former QPR targetman reckons the secret behind being more productive in an attacking sense, he also has three assists for the Addicks, is pretty self-explanatory.
“It’s more minutes on the pitch - at Birmingham I wasn’t getting much game time,” said the Australian-born striker. “I think I only started one or two games there. I know I can score in this league, I’ve done it in the past few years.
“Coming into this team, with this manager, I am enjoying my time again. But I’ve also had opportunities to play. My minutes are quite low compared to other players in this league, even with the amount of games that I’ve played. It’s hard to make an impact when you’re not getting many minutes or coming off the bench in the last five or 10 minutes.”
Dykes’ debut saw him come on at the start of the second half and provide the assist for Sonny Carey’s goal in the 1-0 win over Sheffield United at The Valley.
He has added more physicality and Championship know-how to Charlton’s frontline. So how does he rate his impact out of 10?
