Sliding into the Championship
Like Brighton who we
played last week, Fulham have had a fantastic start to the season and are
currently sitting in eighth place, bucking the trend they normally have of
getting promoted into the Premier League and then dropping straight out again.
Usually by this time of the season they are on their second manager and cut
adrift at the bottom and looking clueless, with no chance of getting out of it.
Oh shit, that’s us this season.
Fulham‘s first game back after the World Cup was a
potentially tricky away game at Crystal Palace which they won 3-0, albeit
slightly helped by Palace committing suicide and having two players sent off by
the hour mark. Apparently, Fulham were going to win anyway so the red cards
should not detract from it was a great result. Fulham are managed by Marco
Silva who seems to have assembled a decent team this season. The signing of
Mateus Pereira from Manchester United has proved to be very good, and the
recruitment of 34-year-old Willian, yes that one who used to play for Chelsea
and he used to turn up occasionally for Arsenal. Willian has shown that there
is room in the Premier League for players over the age of 30, something that we
maybe could learn from. In the centre of
midfield, pulling all the strings and setting the tone for the hard work that
this Fulham team puts in, is Harrison Reed who we absolutely sawed off when he
was at St. Mary’s, by recruiting Jordy Clasie, meaning there was no way we’re
going to have two 5 foot 4 midfielders in the same team. Reed never really got
given a chance and though I’m sure that he doesn’t feel like he’s got anything
to prove to anyone today, he will no doubt be fired up. As I said, a feature of
Fulham’s play this season has been hard work and pressing so if we don’t match
that, then we are in for a very long afternoon.
I have to say that the chances of us matching Fulham‘s work
rate are not very high. There have been apologetic noises coming out of St Mary’s
for the performance against Brighton but it’s hard to see too much
significantly different happening today. There probably needs to be changes in
defence and there definitely needs to be changes in midfield so it’ll be
interesting to see what Nathan Jones does.
One thing that he does seem keen to do is to bring Jan
Bednarek back from his Aston Villa loan. It’s like the club are taking the
piss. The theory is that Bednarek has the experience that we need in our
defence. He does in one respect in that he has 40 international caps but he
doesn’t play like he is experienced. He is the most passive defender going and
does not have any leadership skills whatsoever. Also, he burnt his bridges when
he left and you don’t invite someone back who has shit on their own doorstep
unless you absolutely have to. He is no better than any of the centre backs
that we have so why the fuck are we bothering when Jones says we need
aggression and players who play on the front foot.
Team news and it looks like we’re going with three at the
back with ABK, Lyanco and Salisu all included. It’s hard to know what the fuck
is going on in midfield because there’s only JWP but as the game kicks off it
looks like a 343 formation with JWP and Elyounoussi in the centre of midfield.
Maitland-Niles is on the right with KWP on the left and the front three are
Edozie, Adams and for no readily apparent reason, Joe Aribo. I guess the Aribo hasn’t proved to Jones that
he’s not up to it, yet. I have to say that I am not looking forward to another
variation of the three at the back theme.
The opening of the game is incredibly scrappy with neither
team able to get anything going. Fulham are trying to play but aren’t getting
anywhere and Saints are not even trying to play, launching ball forward. The
best chance is when we turn over possession, usually when Fulham over play and
it’s 20 or so minutes in before KWP nicks the ball to Edozie, he lays it to Elyounoussi
and his first-time ball forward to put Adams clean through. Adams is clearly waiting for the offside flag
to go up which it doesn’t, and he takes a heavy touch inside onto his right
foot and Leno uses that to get out and block the shot. And the flag still
doesn’t go up. Che never looked like he was going to score.
The resulting corner saw another almighty scramble in the box
the ball eventually dropping to Adams who shot was blocked by Palhinha. I have a feeling that if it had gone in then
it would’ve been disallowed for an earlier offside against ABK.
We are using the same tactics as against Brighton with giving
the ball to Edozie at every opportunity and he dribbles infield and plays a
nice 1-2 with Adams before drilling straight at the keeper from the edge of the
box. Good move from a player who is rapidly becoming our most important
attacking outlet.
Fulham finally come to life and send Robinson away on our right. His cross is missed by Bazunu, in a
action replay of the second goal against Brighton but this time, ABK is behind
him to slide it out for a corner. The danger isn’t over though as when the
corner is in mid-air, everyone can see that it’s heading for Pereira on the
edge of the box and no fucker is marking him.
Pereira, volleys it and it’s going wide but it flicks off of JWP and
ends up in the net. It looks like there are about four players in front of
Bazunu obstructing his view in offside positions, but fuck knows what the rule
is these days. Probably somehow,
the deflection off of JWP means they’re all onside or something. I have a
question. How can you be marking players in the middle of your own penalty area
and not see the guy loitering around on the edge of the D. Where’s the goalkeeper or captain or leading
centre back making sure everyone is in the right place and saying, ‘who’s got
that fucker on the edge of the box?’
Half-time comes and we’re 1-0 to a team who haven’t had a
shot on target. Go Us. We’ve had the better chances but we’ve mainly
just been banging it up to Che and hoping for the best. After Half time and it’s formation tombola
again. We now have a flat back four
with KWP on the right-hand side and it looks like Salisu who is playing at left
back with Maitland-Niles having gone into the centre of midfield to hopefully
improve on his Lincoln master class. Jones is just fucking winging it isn’t he –
another admission that he got it wrong at the start. Anyway after an early Fulham scare with a cross
right along the 6 yard line that no one attacks, followed by a cross in from
the other side which Pereira knocks wide at the near post with Baz floundering,
Saints are suddenly the better side and are all over Fulham and are pressing
higher at the pitch.
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Edozie then nicks the ball of Dan James was running back towards his own goal and Edozie sets off and Armstrong and Elyounoussi combine before Armstrong’s shot is blocked. We are still carrying a threat and Fulham are not really causing us any problems, but we are causing our own as Robinson hangs of a high cross towards Mitrović at the back post and Baz shits himself and drops it. Fortunately, the ball drops to Tete who is the right back and can’t shoot and he lashes it into the seats to the left of the goal.
Edozie seems to have gone down with cramp but with Saints still on the front foot, Jones decides to bring on Romain Perraud instead of a like for like attacking replacement and the change is almost instantaneous as we go back into our shell and encourage Fulham to come forward. We get lucky as a ropey rushed clearance by Baz is brilliantly laid off by Adams to Stuart Armstrong who slides Perraud in and he had an opportunity to take the shot first time and didn’t take it and he also had the opportunity to go down under Tete’s sliding challenge, but he didn’t do that either.
87 minutes and Fulham are on top now and we’re settling for a point. The ball gets played inside the full-back and ABK makes a mess of trying to get to Cairney who goes down pathetically appealing for a penalty. He wins a corner though and from that, it’s a flick on at the near post and there is Palhinha with a free header at the back post. Fucking crap. It’s so easy. The flick of the near post is by a totally free player and the header at the back post is unmarked as well. Bullshit.
With two minutes to go Jones decides to bring on a couple of strikers with Mara and Armstrong coming on, along with Lavia we get done again, ironically with a big pump forward. Lyanco makes an almighty bollocks of it trying to head it back to Baz and then Lyanco and Baz between them managed to sandwich Dan James who of course, needs absolutely no invitation to hit the deck. Penalty. Up steps Mitrović, who has been shit so far and his soft side footed effort is easily turned away by Baz. It’s a mere consolation though because one minute later, final whistle and game over. Shit. Well that was an improvement on the Brighton display but ultimately, though we were unlucky to lose, we bottled it. The key moment was when Sam Edozie went off after we played pretty well for the first half an hour of the second half but instead of bringing on another attacker, we went with a left back and I was kind of hard to tell whether the formation changed or not, we stopped pressing Fulham in their own half and allowed them to play, which invited them onto us, which ultimately led to them creating chances and the second goal because as everyone should know, if we allow teams to put us under pressure, we aren’t good enough to keep a team out.
Both goals that we conceded were completely preventable. It was bloody obvious that that first corner was going to go towards Pereira. Of course, it’s unlucky that the ball spins into the net off JWP but there was a lack of awareness and basic desire to defend about that goal. The second goal was a corner needlessly given away by ABK when he could’ve just belted it into the crowd and to concede from the simple flick on to the back post is diabolical. I hope that whoever our set-piece coach is this week is suitably embarrassed.
Again, Jones set us up with three at the back and though it was better than it was the other times we’ve played it recently, we still went in at half-time 1-0 down having not created very much at all. The switch to 4-2-3-1 made us look immediately better and that got us back into the game via a free kick out of the JWP speciality book. Like I say, it’s kind of hard to tell whether the formation changed when Perraud came on for Edozie but whether it did or not, we stepped back and it cost us.
Gavin Bazunu had a better afternoon than against Brighton. Neither of the goals were his fault and he did save the penalty in the last minute, but it was a game where he had very little to do. However, he still managed to look very uncertain whenever the ball came towards him. There was one drop under no pressure and one flap at a cross and I saw nothing today to change my opinion that he needs a break.
Of the defenders, ABK struggled a bit and should’ve cleared the ball before the corner which led to the second goal. He got wrapped up in the battle with Mitrović. Both he and Lyanco were clearly trying to wind up the big Serbian and whilst it was good that they competed with him, they both should’ve dealt with certain situations better than what they did. For every good moment Lyanco provides with his aggression and attacking the ball, he provides a moment where he randomly runs miles out of position and he needs to learn quickly not to spread panic in amongst his own defenders. It was a tough assignment for Elyounoussi today, picked as he was in a midfield two with JWP and to be fair, he does some things very well but there were the usual problems when it came time to release the ball, play an important pass or have a shot. There simply isn’t enough there and if we are going to rely on him to do anything on the ball, then we are always going to struggle. Of the forwards, Sam Edozie was once again impressive and it’s very damning that losing a 19-year-old playing only second full game, is the moment that it all went to shit. Edozie commits defenders and causes panic and it’s great to see. Hopefully that won’t get coached out of him. The reason it went to shit was largely down to the choice of substitute from the manager in my opinion.
Having tried Djenepo as the other winger against Brighton, today it was Joe Aribo‘s turn and he was shite. I’m struggling to remember a more languid footballer than Aribo. It’s okay being languid if you do brilliant things when you’ve got the ball, the most obvious example being Matt Le Tissier, but Aribo doesn’t seem to have the desire to get on the ball on most occasions. Someone like Sofiane Boufal had magic feet so he could beat someone in a very small space, Aribo doesn’t quite have that so when the muck and bullets start flying, it is somewhat difficult to see what Aribo brings to the table. I guess some players can adapt to playing higher level opposition than you face in Scotland but at the moment, I’m struggling to see where Aribo fits in. Might as well try him as another striker if all we are going to do is boom the ball forwards. Ultimately, though it was an improved performance, it was another shit result against a team that despite their lofty position, are really not that good. Next up is Nottingham Forest at home and if anyone thinks that we don’t need anything other than a win in that game, then you are severely deluded. Nathan Jones will know that he absolutely must win this game. Since his appointment was not what people were expecting given the situation that we were in, he needed to get some results quickly. The fact that we haven’t in these last two games means that the heat is really on already and it doesn’t bear thinking about what the atmosphere at St Mary’s will be like if we lose this one.
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