Euell and Johansson take Charlton into the top six

Charlton Athletic 3 Aston Villa

Graham Taylor is rarely short of a word, but the Aston Villa manager had trouble getting head and tongue round the margin of this defeat. "I am trying to come to terms with the fact that it was 3-0," he said after Charlton's win had been boosted by a couple of goals in the dying minutes by the substitute Jonatan Johansson.

It was not so much, as Taylor thought, that "we must have run over a black cat somewhere along the line", simply that Charlton at the moment are performing with irresistible momentum. This was their fifth successive League victory and it lifted them to sixth in the Premiership. In fact, Charlton's past 15 outings in the League have brought 10 wins, four draws and what manager Alan Curbishley called "one defeat on the beach" – that loss to Chelsea on a heavily sanded Stamford Bridge pitch.

Soon enough, the merit of Charlton's run will be tested. It is Arsenal away next weekend and then comes a visit from another high-flying lot, Newcastle United. Can Curbishley remember such times in his 12 years at the club?

"Well, we were top after a couple of games once," he smiled. "And two years ago we finished ninth."

Even when the settled side who have driven them along this road to success are disrupted by injury or suspension, Charlton are nowadays a club capable of slotting in replacements who perform up to the level of the people they have replaced.

The first-choice centre- backs, Gary Rowett, Richard Rufus and Mark Fish, all missed yesterday's match, so in stepped the Moroccan Tahar El-Khalej for his first game since arriving from Southampton. Partnering him was the occasional defender Jonathan Fortune, but between them they held the middle, despite the occasional wobble against the inelegant, but uncannily effective, Villa giant Peter Crouch.

Taylor had also made changes in a bid to improve his team's woeful away record. The Turkish international defender Alpay played for the first time since October, and – a sentimental touch, this – Mark Kinsella was picked on the occasion of his return to the club he left last autumn after six happy seasons.

Having been applauded by the crowd and presented with a piece of glassware as a memento, it was not long before Kinsella found himself being booed, and booked, for fouling Jason Euell. Villa were the more dangerous side for 20 minutes, but Charlton took control just before the interval. Peter Enckelman turned over a superb dipping volley by Euell and then the Finnish keeper repelled Kevin Lisbie's fierce shot, taken on the turn.

The breakthrough came early in the second half. Jensen and Scott Parker moved the ball along to Euell, who controlled it on his chest, turned Alan Wright and shot low past Enckelman.

Villa upped their work-rate in search of the equaliser and twice were only just denied. From a corner Darius Vassell's header and a Crouch shot were both scrambled off the line by Parker, who had another marvellous match.

Vassell, who broke a blood vessel in his nose soon after the start, was forced off after 65 minutes, and 10 minutes later Villa missed their last chance to take something from this game. Crouch, collecting a rebound and finding himself in space, opted to side-foot his shot and a grateful Dean Kiely fell on the ball. "You have to put some venom behind those chances," said Taylor.

After a bad miss, Lisbie was replaced by Johansson and within five minutes had become a hero, though he had to thank Parker for it. The Charlton man got away from Alpay, cut in along the goal-line and pulled the ball back for Johansson to tap in. And with Villa bemoaning their misfortune, another substitute, Mathias Svensson, headed a corner towards goal, where Johansson managed to apply a touch to nudge it over the line.

Charlton Athletic 3 Aston Villa 0
Euell 51, Johansson 87, 90

Half-time: 0-0 Attendance: 26,257