SAM Allardyce put Wanderers misfiring start into historical context today as he set about keeping spirits high in the Reebok dressing room.

Reacting to Saturday's home defeat by Charlton, which left his side pointless after their first two games, the manager recalled how Middlesbrough and Southampton survived nightmare starts last season before going on to claim comfortable mid-table Premiership positions.

"If we don't put it right in the next game, the catch-up levels become huge," he acknowledged, "and the catch-up can take as many as 10,12 or 15 games. We know that from experience of other teams who have had bad starts but Middlesbrough and Southampton managed it.

"We've just got to get points on the board as soon as possible."

Nevertheless, Allardyce knows the poor start could be damaging to morale and admits: "Whether you look at the league tables or not, you're under pressure straight away because you've lost two Premiership games. The worry for me is how it plays on the players' minds and how it could enforce a little loss of confidence.

"That's what we've got to guard against and make sure we stay strong, keep doing the things we're doing well and just make sure that when we get the opportunities to kill off the opposition we kill them off then defend what we've got.

"We've been in front twice now and failed to defend it. You can't ask for any more than starting two Premiership games and going in front in the first three minutes twice. We need some resilience, some damned hard work and some damned good determination to hold onto what we've got, then wait for opportunities to punish the opposition.

"We're not doing that at the moment. We can only keep believing, keep getting ourselves organised, keep trying our hardest and looking for something to turn in our favour.

"This time last year we had some good fortune at the right time. Now it's not as good as we'd like but, at the same time, not producing quality in front of goal and quality defending."

For all his concerns about his team's performance, Allardyce laid much of the blame for this result at the feet of referee Matt Messias, who awarded Charlton a dubious penalty for a Bruno N'Gotty challenge on Richard Rufus and rejected Wanderers' appeals when Rufus brought down Henrik Pedersen.

"That's three penalties in two games," he noted, recalling the two conceded at Fulham in last week's opening game of the season.

"I have no complaints about the first two but I saw absolutely nothing whatsoever in this one. I think there was bodily contact but it's a contact sport. If it had been shirt-pulling, okay ... but then at the other end you have Richard Rufus sticking his leg across another player's leg and bringing him down.

"Referees, like us all, are only judged on the major decisions. But it isn't all his fault because we were poor defensively."

There was no doubting the performance was a vast improvement on the Fulham game but no escaping either the fact that, by their own failings, Wanderers squandered three precious points in a game they were expected to win.

"It's hit us early doors that, if you don't get your basics right, this division will punish you.

"Our own poor finishing and our own sloppy defending has cost us at least a point and really what should have been three. But we started the game brightly and, although we had a spell in the match when we came off the pace of it and let the tempo be dictated by Charlton, I thought our overall performance was good.

"Before we had the penalty given against us we had Henrik Pedersen one-on-one with the keeper, Ricardo Gardner on the far post with a free header six yards out that he only had to steer into the net and, even when we didn't get the penalty awarded, the ball fell to Youri and he just had to slide it past the keeper or slide it to Michael Ricketts ... and that doesn't happen either.

"In the second half we had plenty of pressure but this time it was excellent saves from Dean Kiely that denied us - ultimately the one at the end when he saved from Kevin (Nolan) when we could have nicked a point. But it was not our day."

The introduction of teenager Jonathan Walters as a late substitute was a tribute to the youngster's talent and progress since his switch from Blackburn at the end of last season but it underlined the lack of strike cover that is worrying the manager with the transfer deadline now just five days away.

"The lad's done well since being with us," Allardyce said in praise of the youngster. "We are a little bit light there so we decided to give him a little taste because we might need him again at some stage."