A penny for the thoughts of Charlton Athletic chief Guy Luzon as he slipped away into the South London night while the stragglers outside The Valley again hailed Chris Powell.
There’s no doubting the esteem in which the Huddersfield Town gaffer is held in this corner of the capital after three separate spells as a player and one as a manager.
And there’s no doubting how badly he would have wanted a much better performance from his current team, who as he said himself, were second-best as thy dropped back into the bottom half of the Championship.
A first-half free-kick by Icelandic set-piece specialist Johann Gudmundsson and a second-half double by ex-Celtic striker Tony Watt meant Charlton comfortably claimed the points.
Powell, like the thoroughly decent man he is, acknowledged in measured fashion the ovation he was given as he emerged from the tunnel ahead of kick-off.
And after three minutes, the home fans in a bumper 25,545 crowd, swelled by Charlton’s £5 admission offer, broke into applause in recognition of the shirt number Powell wore as a player.
They then settled back to watch the side bossed by Luzon, the third man to take charge of Charlton since Powell’s controversial sacking a year ago, put on an impressive show.
As Powell pointed out both before and after this contest, both he and Charlton have moved on, but unfortunately, Town were far from their best.
After beating Wigan Athletic and Millwall and drawing at Bournemouth in their previous three away games, this was a disappointingly tame display.
Powell had wanted Town to build on last Tuesday’s 3-0 home win over Reading, but instead of being inspired by that success, they looked jaded.
With his squad trimmed during the latest transfer window, and both top scorer Nahki Wells and defender Joel Lynch out injured, the manager had few options in terms of freshening things up.
He made two changes, with James Vaughan and Sean Scannell back in the XI as Wells (shoulder) missed out and Tommy Smith dropped to the bench.
Conor Coady, who missed the Reading match through illness, was also among the substitutes as Town again went 3-4-1-2 with Harry Bunn in behind frontline pair Vaughan and Ishmael Miller.
It was Miller, who scored his first Town goal against Reading, who had the best of the limited opportunities the visitors created, but on this occasion, he was unable to make them count.
Charlton began at a high tempo, and while Igor Vetokele was unable to take advantage of a number of chances, Gudmundsson struck on 34 minutes.
Watt was fouled by David Edgar 25 yards out, and while keeper Alex Smithies went the correct way, he was unable to keep out the midfielder’s well-struck free-kick.
Watt’s first goal, fired home from Vetokele’s 48th-minute pass, sparked the best spell of the game for Town, who brought on Coady and Smith for Jonathan Hogg and Edgar.
A goal would clearly have put a different complexion on things, but the home side stood firm and Watt wrapped things up by rifling home a 72nd-minute shot.
The introduction of Joe Lolley for Bunn had little impact, and home substitute Chris Eagles had a cross-cum-shot palmed against the woodwork by Smithies in stoppage time.
Now Powell will look for a far better performance – and result – at Brentford on Tuesday.
