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.
Totally agree with Highgatespur regarding Sandro alongside Parker in away games. The gaping hole in centre midfield, punting long panicky balls out of defence and lazy hold and passing from Adebayoure all contributed to the second half debacle. Belatedly Sandro was brought on. Still 3 points and on we go !
The pitch is tiny – just got so congested. Watching live there is so different from my south upper perspective. Modders and Parker had no time, Bale and Lennon had no space.
Very lucky to win and a pretty uninspiring performance – thought there would be more energy given they all had Thursday night off. Sandro should have been on much earlier
Though Brad is there to make saves don’t think any particular save was world class? His kicking was shocking and must have given the ball straight back to them 20 times in the last 10 minutes – every kick aimed at 7’7″ Hangerlaand.
I am not sure why people think it was an uninspiring performance. The first half was a cruise. Why do people forget? The second half, Spurs played average, and were 2nd best. But Good first half + average second half = ok performance. 3 points. 7 wins in 8. Best Premier league start. All this without a manager – which obviously was a factor. Let it go. Let’s crush the Villa.
Oh, and there were about 3 world class saves in there. Watch it again – I will tonight…
I was there and their crappy stadium doesn’t have any screens pitchside so didn’t get the benefit of replays – I really can’t remember Brad having to dive for any though (just moved house and no SKY+ for me). Compared to the performance against QPR it was poor (I think the small pitch had more of an impact on the quality than lack of manager). Was very happy to be 2-0 up at half time though it probably wasn’t deserved.
It’s strange how Cudicini seems to roll every ball out while Brad hoofs at will – do they just choose for themselves?
someone said it was a larger pitch then the lane
Also had to watch from behind settee. For the first time the remarkably talented spine went wobbly: DVD not dictating the top end, Modric’s worst game since Liverpool away two seasons ago (setting aside Citeh and Yernited this season for ‘head not right’ reasons) and Parker banged out of it. When three of the best are not at their best it was Fulham v. 8. Agree Sandro could have come on earlier, but for Modric not Lennon who has now made and scored goals two weeks running and looked miffed to come off. There again had Modric been off the equaliser would have gone in… Definitely not a great day and I’m not convinced about this ‘great squad’ business – Sandro, Gallas, Defoe, Dawson, who? Not Rose, Corluka, Pienaar, Pav, Bassong, maybe Krancjar, maybe Hudd, maybe in my Dreams Dos S, maybe one day/some day Livermore, Townsend.
I thought the tactical error was replacing VDV with Defoe instead of Sandro. We were outnumbered and – worryingly – outmuscled in midfield. Sandro and Parker holding would have freed Modric more and given Murphy some defensive problems instead of letting him stroll around dictating the game. Harry and his staff are rarely proactive enough for me in reading how the tide has turned in the game. Both last week against QPR and yesterday the writing was on the wall for a good while before the goal went in. Teams that go in 2-0 down at half time are bound to change things yet we don’t seem to react until it is too late. Still three points though…
Bingo.
Sandro likes to press the ball further up the field. With him doing that (pressurising the man in possession) and Parker patrolling the deep many of their attacks would have been less effective.
They did not pass it through us too often but did launch a lot of balls into our area. In that situation Spurs needed to keep a higher line and pressurise the man in possession better (like they did to us). Instead we could contain them coming forward but they had time to pick a long ball which caused many problems.
Sandro would have been the answer BUT at the same time, they were playign very effectively against us on a small congested picth and it would have been even harder for us to be effective going forward with 1 up top with no suupport.
SO Sandro in theory was the answer to our defensive situation but would have compounded our attacking/possession problems.
Ahhhemmm…
Craven Cottage Pitch 110 x 75 yards versus WHL Pitch 110 x 73 yards
It’s a bit of a David Blain
wow – that’s really strange, it just always seems so congested there
even more strange is that sat close at CC it looks small whilst sat further away at WHL it looks bigger
Yes ,but the white lines are 10ins thick
Like everybody else I was screaming for Sandro to come on,when he did it didn’t change much.I find it hard to understand the teams mentality when we play away,what happens to all the quick precise passing game and why is our defence scared to leave the edge of the box no matter where the ball is
We played at a snails pace yesterday, no speed or zip to our passing or movement apart from twice in the first half, which led to 2 goals.
Second half was very worrying hate to think what would happen if we do that against a top side.
I don’t get this huge difference between our home and away performance quality either.
Like watching 2 totally different teams.
We raise our games vs top sides usually.
Did not raise our game against the 2 Manchester clubs at the start of the season.
I just think that if we carry on with these hot and cold performances we will get found out sooner rather than later.
we are lousey at defending but got away with it Sunday 3 points