Chris Iwelumo and Luke Varney were on target in the first half as the Addicks cruised to an ultimately comfortable success, their second in a week following Tuesday's win over Norwich, to take their unbeaten run to five games.

Pardew explained: "We set a target for our performance on Tuesday and took it on a step, it was a good day for Charlton.

"I thought the centre-halves were terrific, and Jose Semedo had his strongest game since he's been here, so we can take a lot of pluses from today.

"My record shows my teams are stronger in the second half of the season so that bodes well.

"I've not had a chance to see a lot of the sides, but the teams we've been up against show it's a tough division, and I'm pleased that we've started well. But that's all we've done, start well.

"Seven games and 14 points means we're on schedule, and that's the standard we have to stick to in the next seven games.

"After 10 games you can usually tell how you're going so we'll see where we are after the next three."

The Foxes won many plaudits for their sporting gesture of gifting Nottingham Forest a goal in their Carling Cup game this week, but five days later their defenders were still in a generous mood at the Valley.

Twice Gary Megson's side failed to deal with high balls into the area and twice they were punished as Iwelumo grabbed his third goal of the season and Varney the first of his Charlton career.

The early pressure told in the 18th minute when Danny Mills' long throw was helped on by Zheng Zhi and Iwelumo was on hand to rifle the ball past Marton Fulop.

And five minutes later Varney, the $6million summer signing from Crewe who missed the opening month of the season through injury, was in on the act.

Iwelumo got up between City defenders Patrick Kisnorbo and Gareth McAuley to meet Mills' cross and nod the ball down to Varney, who made no mistake from six yards.

Megson, Leicester's fifth manager in 18 months, suffered his first defeat in charge and admitted he has a lot of work to do at the club.

"We gifted the game to Charlton early on," he said. "We started well and had a few shots from distance but we didn't make them work hard enough for their goals.

"The defending for those goals had to be seen to be believed, and it wouldn't be acceptable on the parks tomorrow morning.

"We finished stronger than we started, but that has to be the other way round.

"I've only been here eight days but the team has had three seasons of relegation struggles and hadn't started well when I got here.

"It needs time to settle down, but it's obvious a great deal of work needs to be done."