Hello!
All too frequently not nice viewing. I used the word ‘lottery’ in relation to previous outcomes at Craven Cottage and I stand by it. Fulham are not a great footballing side. What they are is a rag bag collective of players that occasionally get them out of a scrape playing on a pitch that reminds me too much of the Library.
The narrow ping pong table of a pitch created a scenario whereby v d Vaart and Modders achieved little and the almost totla absence of anything resembling a centre back on our behalf allowed players like Zamora occasionally look like Lionel Messi.
9.893 Clips from Brad’s performance will be undoubtedly be used in goal keeping classes up and down the land. His reactions were superb but he must be wondering how in his ‘dotage’ he’s having to put such punishing shifts!
4.675 Any chance we can lose the daft complicated feints and just whip a cross in, mate? Not a great performance at either end of the pitch.
6.678 Raging Kaboul in a china shop. Not his finest hour. He exemplified the fiasco. Some sterling hoofs, but these routinely landed at the feet of Fulham players. More thought required next time out, please.
6.789 Decent performance but far from the class he owes himself, let alone us. But then he was too frequently fire fighting single handed.
6.321 If I was pushed to sum him up in one word it would have to be unremarkable. If it was two words, the pretty unremarkable. He’s Tweeting and column writing like a trooper, now let’s see him play like one.
6.456 Cracking little goal, but that was almost the sum total of his contribution. We lacked width. He’s a winger. I don’t think the jury will be out long.
6.210 Another quiet game bar a Boys Own save off the line. He was hemmed in and we desperately needed to – but failed miserably – to do anything to change our shape or personnel to fix that. Poor possession.
7.100 He was overrun. Modric should have been swapped for Sandro at half time to help shore up the gaping hole in the centre of the park, but wasn’t. I’m unconvinced that the brutal assault by the thug Sidwell did much to boost his mood.
6.987 Top quality ball in to force the goal. But aside from that and the glorious pass to Azza he wasn’t 100% there. Poor possession.
5.999 Frustrating game. He just couldn’t get into it. Fulham suffocated him and our shape did little to offer him air.
7.459 I genuinely admired him out there. Pav, Defoe, Crouch etc would have all stay up there waiting for the ball to break. But Ade played selflessly. He knew the ball had to be pulled out of the quagmire and he went in to do his bit. Never a threat, but he played intelligently.
7.890 Got the break, buried it. I stand by my praise of Adebayor. That man is a team player as well as a talented finisher.
Wandering across Putney Bridge, admiring the view down the Thames and then taking the classy walk through the Park always makes me forget how useless we usually are at Craven Cottage.
The best walk to a ground anywhere in the country.
Lets just be honest even in the first half we were at best average. The second was just a debacle. Still as dutchman says, 3 points.
It feels good to win when we play shit. Cant remember the last time………
Great result, but a few major points I noted…
Freidel had a great game, but sometimes should have been looking for something to do with the ball instead of constantly hoofing it straight back to Fulham’s back 4.. Adebayor sometimes at fault for not chasing, but sometimes the kick out was just nowhere near a spurs shirt. Could also argue he could have come and punched the corner that they scored from.
Modric looked uninterested for much of the game. Thank god he woke up when he was on the post and cleared their goal bound effort.
King has lost a yard or 2 of pace, but still looks so calm compared to others in threatening situations.
Parker battled, but after him head injury seemed in a little bit of a daze and with Modric not looking interested we were completely out battled in the middle of the park.
I think if they had been given a penalty from Walker’s handball it would have been very harsh. Slow motions shows it did hit his hand, but the speed of the ball forced the ball to land there after he had fallen and was pushing himself back up to his feet.
Shortly before this, Parker should have had AT LEAST a free kick on the edge of their box where they took him out while lining up a short. Seconds later they went down the other end and had their penalty appear. If the Parker foul was correctly given, they wouldnt have had that goal mouth scramble, so the Fulham fans & media stiring that one don’t really have valid arguement.
I also dont think you can argue a 2 goal cushion being down to 1 decision. Used to happen to us all the time against Arsenal & Chelsea. 1 bad decision, they would go on to win by 2 or more goals. Their fans always would say to me you can argue it. Fulham we unlucky and probably deserved a draw, but we won by 2 goals. So a great result away from home overall, especially without Harry there and our squad still having a number of injuries. International break at least gives us some time to build our fitness up again after a good run of results.
Without question the failure to introduce Sandro at half time was the major reason for the way the 2nd half panned out. Without help Parker was being closed down which meant Modric was ineffective, having to track back to forage for the ball. With a massive hole for Fulham to exploit the defence was constantly under pressure and ‘hoofing’ it up, merely gave Fulham possession again. The failure to put Sandro on, in itself nullified both our midfield and forward line causing a re-enactment of the Alamo, but with a better result for the Texicans this time, hope the lessons been learnt about playing the Brazilian away from home!
When 2-0 up at half time, you cannot make an unenforced substitution like that. You have got to see how the 2nd half starts before you make such a change. Only when you are losing or getting overrun in the 1st half do you make changes at the break. Yes, we were are calling for Sandro earlier than he came on, but you must show faith in the ones who got you 2 up in the first instance.
One of the few tricks that successful people use is to see the potential danger before it happens…. nearly too late yesterday…. COYMS
That’s what I was referring to about changing a winning team and hindsight. I felt we were getting closed down too easily in the first half and considered that if Fulham stepped it up in the 2nd we’d be up against it. Also no-ones mentioned the ref, who let an awful lot of dubious tackles go and missed many crucial calls in the process, showing his incompetence over Sidwell’s forearm assault on Parker and his blatant push on the same player,which of neither warranted a free kick let alone a yellow card, but all this baloney about stats are doing my head in
Looking forward to the next batch of matches – hope we keep this run going …. unbelievable two and a half months… I have begun to take the ref’s mistakes as part of the game nowadays…. I also thought Sidwell should have gone for that elbow – intentional – don’t know but elbow was up and he hit Parker on the head – they’ve history… the push for our penalty definitely… the only thing I wanted to change was the opponent – God how I wished the match was at other SW6 club !!!! COYMS – 3rd equal and smiling !!!!
glad you saw it too
TR Davspurs would have made eleven changes at Half time don’t forget Fulham rested there player in midweek and was fresh.?VRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM?
I was half expecting Sandro being introduced into play wearing a Davy Crocket hat….. :daumen: oh and we are quits….no like when VdV no score goal :-(
Yeah I know, but it was a tough ask for Rafa, but it’s also difficult to change a winning team, and the simple fact is we’ve got hindsight and they keep winning.If he’d a have put Sandro on earlier I really feel we’d have plugged that gaping hole, but when he put JD on I thought…Nah, I wont say it, but Parker did a mean John Wayne all the same ;-)
VDV looked unfit to me against Fulham or he didn’t want to mix it one of the two
Also we really struggled to hold the ball up top throughout the game. Not all Adebayor’s fault, possibly lack of support from Midfield, but it was one of our biggest problems yesterday.
I think I’ll record all games from now on and watch 45 mins behind the actual kick-off time.
That way I can wizz forward the opposition’s “onslaught” later in the second half.
Bit like watching Dr. Who as a kid. From behind the settee!