Premier League Match 34 - Southampton 1 Fulham 2

 

The Point of Destiny Eludes Us Again

The natural order of things for Fulham, when they’ve been in the Premier League, is to be one of the teams bobbing around the bottom six with a very real chance of being drawn into the relegation battle. No such problems now of course, partly due to the management of Marco Silva And good recruitment of players, and partly due to the fact that they managed to stay in the Premier League exactly the right time that the dynamics changed financially and it became a League where there are 17 full memberships and three 1-year visitors passes every season.

If we just look at Fulham the team, then they are decent and deserve to be having the upper mid-table season that they are having.  Shrewd recruitment of players who have been discarded by traditionally bigger Premier League clubs has built them a squad that is very capable of sneaking into a Europa league or conference league place at the end of the season.  Their whole squad is littered with players who were at other Premier League or top foreign clubs before, so there is little risk of signing a player who doesn’t adapt. They have built a team of players who were experienced at Premier League or decent European level before they joined.  The list is long…. Leno (Arsenal), Andersen (Palace), Castagne (Leicester), Iwobi (Everton), Berge (Sheffield Utd), Jimenez (Wolves), Traore (Wolves and Barcelona), Wilson (Bournemouth), Smith-Rowe (Arsenal) and so the list goes on. It’s an object lesson to teams who think you can recruit solely from academies or from unheard of players sampling English football for the first time.  Then of course you have to make the player better.  Alex Iwobi for example, was discarded by Arsenal and then Everton and now looks the best player he has ever been in a Fulham shirt. Raul Jimenez was a bit of a gamble but he has paid back that gamble to be their top goal scorer this season. Also via Wolves came Adama Traore and whilst I still severely question how he ended up looking exactly like that, no one can deny he is a proper handful, not that you can get a handful of him because of all the baby oil on his arms.

Manager, Marco Silva has always had a streak of arrogance about him like a Poundshop Mourinho and he clearly thinks that it’s about time he moved to a bigger club because he’s just started talking up how good a job he’s done at Fulham. Fair play but careful what you wish for Marco. Everton didn’t exactly work out did it?

Such has been the woeful state of this season, there has been an air of positivity around Saints this week based on getting a last-minute draw against the team in 17th. This is a big game for Simon Rusk and for the club because of the abysmal home record that Saints have endured over the last three Premier League seasons and because of the fact that are two remaining home fixtures after this are against Manchester City and Arsenal, so realistically this is the last chance for a home win before next season and of course we need to acquire The Point of Destiny to end talk of Derby.

Team news and just the one change with Saints with Tall Paul clearly not fit as he’s not even on the bench. Into the team comes Ross Stewart, which is a redemption story just waiting to happen.  As the game starts it quickly becomes apparent that Fulham are going to have most of the ball and that most of their attacking is going to come down our right hand side with Willian trying to cut in on his right foot and Sessegnon going outside. An early warning shot is fired by the Brazilian as he cuts onto his right foot and curls it about a yard wide of Rambo‘s far post.

Twenty minutes gone and more or less from our first attack, Manning buys a free kick off of Pereira as he goes to clear and it’s about 25 yards out in line with the edge of the penalty area. Our record from free kicks this season has been spectacularly bad but lo, a fucking miracle as Manning skims over the free kick at a perfect height and Jack Stephens gets up to flick it past Leno and in at the fare post. Fucking hell, we scored a free kick.  Here comes The Point of Destiny, it’s in the fucking bag and we are massive and we will win this, beat Leicester next week to go above them and when Manchester City and Bournemouth get deducted a hundred points each, then we’ll stay up.

Soon to be Legendary Free-Kick Combination

Meanwhile, back on this planet, the good news is that Saints are still posing an attacking threat despite going ahead and after a Fulham attack is broken up by a Big Les, KWP puts the ball in behind to allow Ross Stewart to run onto it.  He gets to the ball first before Bassey but the big defender moves across and shuts the door with Stewart being swatted away by the bigger man. There is a half arsed appeal for a penalty but that’s never getting given.

Bassey meets his match soon after though as he tries to muscle Fernandes off the ball and after an almighty tussle, the little Portuguese kid emerges with the ball and we spread it out to the left-hand side. The ball gets popped through to Sulemana and Andersen comes clattering across in untidy fashion but unlike any other winger, Sulemana stays on his feet rather than going down and then hits his usual daisy cutter straight to the keeper. Wrong decisions all round.

Fulham are having most of the possession without getting anything on target and the frustration is obvious as Tete crosses from the right hand side and Raul Jimenez nearly puts his volley out of the ground.  A few more minutes of defending and half time.

To be fair, we’ve done okay and Fulham of look limited but Marco Silva is clearly not very happy at halftime because Berge and Pereira don’t come out and instead it’s Lukic and the big sprinter/boxer himself, Adama Traore. Ryan Manning must have muttered a silent “oh fuck off” to himself at this point, when he saw what he’s got to play against in the second half.

Traore is a strange footballer, because he’s not very good but he’s so big and fucking quick that he is effective, and he barrels his way across the pitch before finding Willian about 20 yards out and his curled effort flies beautifully past Ramsdale before crashing into the post. You can see the problem straight away, that we seem to be ten yards deeper than we were in the first half and just allowing Fulham to play

We have an increasingly rare attack as Downes brings the ball forward with a diagonal run towards the left and finds Sulemana and what wrong decision will come out next?  Eventually it’s a pretty aimless chip to the back post which gets headed away and drops down, with Downes turning on it on the edge of the box and the ball eventually defects left and KWP takes and smashes it but Leno takes off to pull off a perfectly executed ‘one for the cameras’ save.

On the hour mark, it’s time for fresh legs to make our team weaker, but it’s understandable as Ross Stewart has to go off to be replaced with Cameron Archer. Archer surprises everyone who has seen him play this season by getting the ball on the right hand side and bursting past Bassey before trying to put in a cross which pings off the outside of the post and is eventually cleared.

Emile Smith-Rowe has come on for Fulham in place of Willan and it is he who bursts into the box, lost by Fernandes, to pick up a chipped ball in from Sessegnon and drive a goalward effort it defelcts off of Bednarek’s boot, high over Ramsdale and into the net. Fuck off. 25 minutes to go and now hanging on for The Point of Destiny will be all that matters.

Lucky Deflected Little Fucker

Sulemana then has to make a decision as to which way to walk off the pitch after being substituted and he successfully picks one, to be replaced on the left-hand side by Dibling. Fulham are now camped on the edge of the box now and we don’t seem to be able to get the ball away.  It’s lucky that Traore decides to take on a shot rather than pass it to someone more talented, and curls it in shit fashion over the bar. Traore is at it again a minute later, dribbling across the box before finding Smith-Rowe in the middle and his shot is brilliantly tipped away by Ramsdale.

88 minutes and what the fuck?   Two minutes plus extra time to earn The Point of Destiny and oh this is absolute fucking murder as it’s James Bree coming on for Fernandes. It looks like KWP has been pushed forward so this is going to be horrible. Meanwhile, on the other side, Traore gets down our left to the byline and hangs a ball up into the middle, which Raul Jimenez can only head straight at Rambo.

90, 91, 92 minutes and we can’t get the ball away in Smith-Rowe picks up on the right, finds Traore and his cross into the middle his met by Sessegnon, who has come from the left and is completely unmarked about 8 yards out and stoops to head the ball past Ramsdale to give Fulham the win. Fuck sake.  The Point of Destiny is snatched away.  Needless to say, after failing to attack for the best part of 45 minutes, we don’t have a lot to offer in the two minutes that remain.

Well, fuck. I should know better but I genuinely thought we were gonna win that game and that Fulham wouldn’t score but of course, once they did, via a bastard big deflection, the second goal did seem kind of inevitable, especially when we made the substitution of creeping death as the last few minutes ticked round. The obsession the managers have with making substitutions will never fail to baffle me. We’ve defended well for 88 minutes with the same five defenders and the two midfielders in front of them so naturally, change the right hand side of that defence with two minutes to go. Guess who scored for Fulham, yes, the left back who ran into the area untracked. Not only are we bringing on James Bree, who is going to make any Premier League team worse but we then reshuffle the defensive unit. We always manage to be our own worst enemies it’s not always the case but in the context of this season and with this group of players, if things are going well, then you are better off just fucking leaving it.

There were many parallels with the Villa game a couple of weeks ago and that we defended well until well into the second half very well but the concentration levels required and the quality that the opposition can bring off the bench, compared to the lack of quality on ours, did for us in the end. Like with Villa, who brought three goal scorers off the bench, Fulham brought on Traore, who set up the winner and Smith-Rowe who scored the first and had ahand in the second.

Both goals were conceded were down to an untracked runner turning up unmarked in the middle of our penalty area. Smith-Rowe ran off the back of Fernandes and Sessegnon wandered in from left back.  In the first half we were decent value for the lead that we had from Jack Stephens flicked header from Manning’s cross . It just goes to show that set pieces can be undefendable if the delivery is right and it also highlights how poor our deliveries from set pieces have been in general this season.  We had one other chance of note in the game with KWP finding himself in the area and bringing a decent save out of Leno. Other than that though, it was very slim pickings and we seem to be playing with no thought of attacking in the entire second half, which against a good side, is not often going to work. You have to maintain some sort of attacking threat otherwise the opposition can just do what they like with no thought of consequence.

The starting 11, in the main did pretty well. Les and Flynn were outstanding in the centre of midfield and the three central defenders were all very solid. Ross Stewart got through 60 minutes and looked half decent I thought. I still can’t really work out what kind of player he is. There is a temptation, because he is 6 foot 3, to think of him as a target man, but he’s not really and he wants to run in behind. There was one incident in the first half where he ran in behind Calvin Bassey and just didn’t have the strength to do anything once he got to the penalty area and it’s then that you realise that regardless of all the injuries, he has never played at this level before.

Should We Make Another Sub Adam?

Positives are that Simon Rusk has identified our best starting XI and changed that as little as possible.  No one can fault the effort of the players either and there’s been plenty of times this season when that was up for debate.  He’s also worked out that Les and Flynn have to play the full 90 and that happened for the second game running.  Negatives for Rusk are the aforementioned late sub and tinkering and once again that shone a poor light on our squad, as did the fact that the best option with Tall Paul’s injury is a player who hasn’t played for nearly three years.  Stewart was the best option because the strikers we expected to rely on this season - Archer, Brereton-Diaz and Armstrong are either crap, or no longer here, or both.

A final word for today is reserved for Marco Silva and the word is twat.  Some more words are horrible entitled little shit.  How dare we set up to defend and be solid when we’ve had the season we’ve had.  Go fuck yourself you dickhead.

Onwards and it’s time for El Crappico and a trip to the King Power to play Leicester next week. They have not scored in the last nine home league games so they need a goal and we need a point, so 1-1 it is then.

Premier League Match 17 - Fulham 0 Southampton 0

 

Please Stay Fit Rambo

Ivan Juric was announced as the new Saints manager just after the Carabao Cup defeat to Liverpool, meaning that I guess it will be some sort of combination between him and Simon Rusk to put the team on the field today against Fulham.  In Juric’s first interview, he spoke of wanting to play aggressive, pressing football but I wonder how aware he is of the players he has got, to try and play this way. For example, if he is expecting his central midfielders to run non-stop for 90 minutes then Adam Lallana and Joe Aribo, not to mention Will Smallbone, might as well retire.  There is a video kicking around of when Juric was the manager at Torino and the Sporting Director and him had a handbags session in the car park.  No one asked him if he would fancy doing a few car park rounds with Rasmus Ankersen, which was a disappointment.  What that video tells you is that Ivan is probably a little bit of a mad bastard, which is why he took the job.  I don’t think he’s going to be the sort to put up with any crap.

Every new manager comes in with words that sound encouraging and because you are usually at a pretty low ebb when you change manager, it all sounds great. I have learned that actions speak a lot louder than words. One thing that Juric has said though is that we need to get points on the board before New Year, to give us any chance whatsoever of staying in the division. He has signed an 18-month contract but trust me, if he pulls this off, there are always other, richer clubs in need of a miracle worker. First observations are that it sounds that the style of football he is hoping to get us to play will be more Ralph than Russell.

Fulham are now a club that we aspire to be like, in that they got promoted out of the Championship relatively recently but have established themselves in the Premier League and are not even mentioned as potential relegation candidates these days. Marco Silva has got them playing some decent football and they have an experienced, solid Premier League team.  They are capable of dropping in the odd shite performance however and we need to hope for one today. Raul Jiminez has scored a decent number of goals for them this season and he is well supported by Alex Iwobi, who has also chipped in. He’s usually a substitute but we are going to have to deal with the beast that is Adama Traore, when he eventually makes his entrance onto the pitch and he is one who has of course always caused us trouble in the past.

Juric’s go to formation is kind of a 3-4-2-1 and that looks like what we’ve picked today but it’s disappointing for me to see Adam Armstrong in the starting lineup as he has been shit for months and just isn’t up to it. This seems especially strange given that Archer and Tall Paul had decent impact against Liverpool.  The other concern is that Joe Aribo is in midfield and his lack of running and defensive nous will probably be a problem today. The good news is that Aaron Ramsdale is back and the other talking point is that the hot potato that is the captains armband has been passed to Jan Bednarek.  I think that he’s the 6^th on-field captain this season, after Stephens, Downes, Armstrong, McCarthy and THB.

You, Car Park, Now!!!

Ivan hasn’t got a work permit, but he’s here anyway, and takes his place in the crowd as the game starts. Fulham have rested a couple of players as everyone seems to do it against us, so they’re not really creating much and we are certainly not in the mood to cause our own problems and are very safety first at the back. However, Tyler Dibling dribbles across the pitch about 35 yards out and gives the ball away and from the left-hand corner of the penalty area, Iwobi floats over a cross and Ramsdale is suddenly very concerned about it and gets airborne to tip it wide of the far post.

Downes ball in to Dibling is intercepted with the Saints man on its heels and that leads to an effort by Harry Wilson to try and win Goal of the Season as a cross from the left from Robinson is headed away by THB to the edge of the box and Wilson takes it on his thigh before volleying it quite a way over the bar.  The Fulham left is causing us the majority the problems through Iwobi and Robinson and the former takes a pass from the latter and tries to float one into the top corner, but it’s well wide.

As we approach half-time, referee Robinson then makes himself look completely and utterly incompetent as Downes put in a hard-but-fair tackle on 17-year-old debutant King and he waves play on and then two minutes later he puts in an identical challenge on Cairney, takes the ball cleanly and the referee not only gives a free kick which was ridiculous enough, he then books him.

Half time and we’ve been pretty solid to be fair, without creating a thing at the other end of the pitch but we were 5-0 down at this stage in our last league game, so I’ll take it.  Tyler Dibling being replaced by Cameron Archer at half time which is no surprise as Tyler has really struggled to get into the game today.

A little bit of Russ-ball breaks out as Downes and THB work the ball to Archer in the centre circle and he plays it through the gap to send out Armstrong scampering away. He is miraculously not offside, swaps passes with Sugawara and unfortunately, it’s a virtual back pass to the goalkeeper but at least we’ve had a shot on target, which is a fact that is loudly serenaded by the travelling fans.

Anonymous Aribo is replaced by “Back from the Dead” Lesley Ugochukwu and Fulham bring on the massive unit that is Adama Traore.  Traore gets a cross in straight away but Iwobi can only plop the header into the waiting hands of Ramsdale.

There is a moment to shite yourself as a Fulham corner he’s headed out by Bednarek to the right where it’s picked up by the walking supplement bottle, and his left footed cross is met on the bounce on the corner of the 6 yard box by Harry Wilson, who blasts it and Ramsdale flings up an arm to tip it over the bar.  Really good save that.

Big Les is putting himself about strongly and seems to be defensively switched on as well as a ball comes flashing across the top of the penalty area and he smashed goalwards by Jimenez and Les is there to throw himself in the way.

Our manager Rusk Juric brings on James Bree in place of Sugawara, which is a sure sign that we are settling for a point. On the other side, KWP has a bit of a nightmare under a high ball and presents it straight to Traore, who runs at the penalty area, gets a lucky bounce back off a Bednarek tackle and then drills it narrowly wide with his left foot. Fuck me that was close.

Yep, That Was Close

90 minutes are up and Tall Paul is on. KWP does a bit of defending out on the left and then turns and runs down the wing leaving Fulham players in his wake. Castagne is clearly getting worried as he gets towards the penalty area and dives in, gets a bit of the ball but it’s untidy and KWP goes over and ends up in the penalty area. Referee Robinson is of course not interested and we’re off to Stockley Park.

“Hello Stockley Park…. I said hello… anyone there”

[Silence]

[Muffled voices in the background] – “turn that bastard answering machine on”

[Answer phone message] – “Hi there, this is Stockley Park, we’re not here right now as 90 minutes are up and nothing has happened in this game.  If in doubt, go with the referee’s decision as we’re all out on the PGMOL Christmas Piss-Up.  Big Mikey D’s dealer has tipped up and we’re getting right on it.  For acknowledgements of mistakes and apologies, please contact Howard Webb at howard.webb@pgmol-manchesterunited.co.uk...... Leave a message [Beeeeeep]”

We get a corner out of it anyway, and Fernandes swings in and Big Les rises at the back post but it slides off his head and goes out for a throw.

And that’s the end.  Marco Silva looks distraught, and the Fulham players get booed by their fans. A few weeks ago we had Brighton fans suddenly becoming entitled because they are in the top half of the league and failed to beat us, and now Fulham proving that they are no different. Stay humble people.

First things first - that was a decent point today, down to a clean sheet from a dogged defensive effort.  Aaron Ramsdale being back made a huge difference, even though he was playing in a modified goalkeeper glove because two of his fingers were strapped together. With him in goal, the defence actually looked like a unit that the opposition are going have to work hard to get past.  All three of the central defenders put in a good shift to deny Fulham many real chances – Janny B lead from the front by example and THB and Woody were pretty solid and most importantly, as a unit they were solid.  It was only when that totally natural athlete Adama Traoré came on in the second half that they gave us any problems at all.  Rumours that he broke the wishbone on the Christmas turkey one year and wished that he could suddenly transform to being fucking huge and end up looking like a cross between a boxer and an Olympic sprinter, might well be true.

Ryan Manning was unlucky to be dropped but KWP did a solid job down the left and Sugawara on the right didn’t have any defensive nightmares either and he was put under more pressure as most of Fulham‘s play went down that side with the impressive Robinson and Iwobi.  It is also amusing that Marco Silva thought he could rest players against us and for it to go wrong for him. Serves the arrogant bastard right.  It was so sad to see him getting more and more animated and more and more miserable looking at the same time as the second half ticked by.

I was looking today for changes and insights into what we might expect going forward with Ivan Juric who obviously had a hand in things that went on today. One thing straight off the bat was Jan Bednarek as captain and Janny had a tremendous game, and the role of captain seemed to elevate him, unlike the most recent incumbents who it seems to have just weighed down.  When I was thinking about what lineup Ivan might put together when he has his feet under the table, I never even considered big Lesley Ugochukwu as an option and had almost forgotten about him until he came on as a substitute today and put in the kind of performance that I was quite frankly expecting from him when he joined at the start of the season. Pace, power, tackling and generally adding a physical presence. If we can get the best out of him then it certainly would help, and a partnership in the centre of midfield of him and Flynn Downes looks promising.  So – Ramsdale, Wood, Bednarek, THB, KWP, Sugawara, Downes, Big Les…. That’s the goalkeeper and the 3-4 part of the 3-4-2-1 sorted out.

Big Les Back From The Dead

Up front – not much.  Matty Fernandes had quite a lot of defensive responsibility in that he was obviously detailed to get to Sander Berge when we didn’t have the ball to stop Fulham playing out from the back.  Consequently, he wasn’t as effective in an attacking sense as we’d want him to be.  It was no surprise when Tyler Dibling went off at half time as he had struggled to get into the game in the opening 45 minutes but when he went off, so did all of our creativity.  Cam Archer had no impact at all when he came on and Adam Armstrong basically got caught offside a few times and barely touched the ball.  He worked hard but there’s no quality there as we all know. If we are going to play more direct, which it looks like we will, then there is only one option to play upfront, and we all know who that is.

We really didn’t show much in attack today, aside from a little flurry of corners at the end and a burst into the box by KWP which was halted by a strange tackle by Castagne, who won the ball initially but then caught KWP’s trailing leg with his follow-through. We have learnt this season from VAR that, we don’t get those and I don’t think it was even reviewed anyway.

A word today for the referee, Mr. Jim Robinson who was absolutely fucking useless. Downes wins two tackles 100% cleanly within a couple of minutes of each other in the first half and gets booked Flynn for I assume, professionally stopping an attack by winning the ball.  Not long after, he allowed Fulham debutant King, and Berge to tug back Saints players as they went past them with no thought of giving a booking.  We had Fulham under a bit of sustained pressure in the second half, winning a couple of corners but of course he killed the the momentum by stopping the game so Castagne could get up after being felled by next to nothing in a challenge with KWP.  Later on, when Bassey’s flailing arm smacked Fernandes in the mouth, he let it carry on until the ball went dead.  I had a feeling today that even if we had managed to score, he would’ve disallowed it so 0-0 was probably the best we were ever going to get.

So overall, something to build on and it’s another moment in the season where we need to take a positive and win the next game which is at home to West Ham on Boxing Day. It will be Ivan’s first game in charge, as long as he hasn’t twatted one of Sport Republic in the car park between now and then.

Up the fucking Ivan’s Glorious Basterds.

Premier League Match 36 - Southampton 0 Fulham 2

It's Time to Play the Music...

Another day, another last chance as we take on the Fulham at St Mary‘s. All things are possible, we could win and be relegated today, we could do the infinitely more likely lose or draw and be relegated today or we could win and drag this shitshow of a season on to Brighton next week. If the law of sod is to apply, then that is what we will do.  I kind of want it to be done and dusted and I want no possible excuse left for not starting the rebuild that will be needed for next season. I see absolutely no point in wasting time.

Fulham have had a season of over achievement which is markedly contrasted with their usual efforts in the Premier League when they usually find themselves roughly where we are now and immediately return back to the Championship. Not this season though. They were floating around the European places for a while around Christmas but it all came crashing down when they had an FA Cup tie at Manchester United and managed to get two players and the manager sent off in one incident.  The most high-profile fallout from that was of course that their main striker Alexander Mitrović got banned for eight games. Guess who his first game back is against? Yes it’s us today.  Fulham are a very high energy side with the width provided by the full backs Teté and Robinson and the guile provided by 34-year-old Willian. They also of course have Harrison Reed in the centre of midfield who I imagine will be slightly conflicted about what is likely to happen today seeing as he came through the ranks with JWP and joined the club at age 8.  Fulham also have Harry Wilson in their ranks, who has always stood out as a whiny little twat.

I will trudge to St Mary‘s today with very little enthusiasm and I’m sure I will be joined by every other Saints fan who is in there. Yes, we technically still have a chance of staying up but it will take about 15 results between now and the end of the season going our way. Have you ever won a 15 match accumulator when 3 of the results have to be Southampton winning? I very much doubt it.

It will be interesting to see if Ruben Sellers has completely given up himself. His press conference on Thursday revealed that Che Adams was struggling to make the game so will he actually pick a striker or will he go with the false nine bollocks. Will he bring in Dom Ballard and give him a game to see what he’s got or will we go for the same old tried and failed shit. Will the random selection tombola be out in force? If so, will we get Mislav Orsic or will we get Tall Paul, our £18 million striker. I cannot wait to see what Ralph Little comes up with. Maybe he’ll find a new hybrid position for Ainsley Maitland-Niles to be shit in.

Che out, Tall Paul starting klaxon and Lyanco in for ABK but otherwise it’s the same as the Forest game.  Fulham have left Mitrovic out but they scored 5 last week so what’s the rush.  There are a lot of empty seats, usually occupied by Season Ticket Holders – let’s hope they regret not coming and we have a half decent entertaining game at least.

So it’s like a fairly promising start with Stuart Armstrong looking lively as he has done in the last few games, running and beating Tete on the Fulham right but his cross is easily claimed by Bernd Leno when it really needed to be pulled back to the edge of the box.  Then Tall Paul manages to win the ball high and due to lack of support, tries a speculative effort from 35 yards on the angle and Leno just picks it up.  Intent, anyhow.

Fulham have a great chance when Cairney plays the ball square to Wilson the chips into the box with everybody going out for the header, the ball hits Lyanco clearly on the arm and bounces through to McCarthy.  On first glance, I have no idea why this is not given as a penalty as he clearly blocks a goalbound header.

Fulham are taking over now and a crossfield ball sends Tete away on the Saints right and he has all the time in the world to find Wilson, who bursts past Maitland-Niles before setting up Reed and his shot is deflected to Willian, who tees himself up and volleys it past McCarthy but Lyanco has got back to head it off the line. Great defending to be honest and a mad celebration.

Lyanco Celebrates His Clearance

Fulham are keeping the ball well and we are doing absolutely nothing and it’s the same pattern as so many of our home games. It’s really noticeable how deep Walcott and Armstrong are playing which in turn makes Tall Paul completely isolated with Alcaraz trying to get up and support, but we’re not good enough on the ball to enable aim to get there. Theo Walcott on the right is having an absolute beast of a game.

Half-time and that was really fucking boring.  To be honest I’d take Walcott off at half-time and shove Sulemana on and see if he can make anything happen but Selles doesn’t think like that of course so there are no changes.

Ten minutes into the second half and we build up to the right hand side with some decent hold-up play by Tall Paul allowing KWP pick out JWP breaking forward and his ball sends Alcaraz through on Leno one on one, and one of the few good finishers we’ve got at the club sticks in the net and the flag goes up straight away. Close but it’s certainly felt like offside when the ball got through to him.

Straight after that KWP, tries to press gets caught out and Fulham break with Cairney finding Wilson on the right hand side and his ball across the box is read by Lyanco who tries to clear it but it deflects off of the sliding Reed straight to Vinícius who has an open goal. A bit lucky but absolutely fucking typical.  Dead.

KWP tries to make amends by bursting past Willian down the right and slings over a great cross and Tall Paul rises and head is it narrowly over the bar. Lots of power but not much direction but the closest we’ve come to a goal bar the offside.

Having had his first chance and probably feeling a bit better about himself, the big man of course gets substituted along with Walcott, who hasn’t improved.  The boos accompanying Tall Paul off are ridiculous.  It’s not his fault we signed him and it’s not his fault we’re getting relegated as he hasn’t been in the team.  On come Sulemana and Sekou Mara.  Fulham have taken off Vinicius and put on Mitrović and needless to say it’s their sub that works better. Fulham spread play out to the right hand side and Harry Wilson has all the time in the world to measure a cross into the middle to find Mitrović, who bullies KWP out of the way and heads it back across McCarthy and in. Easy.

The rest of the game is an absolute fucking shambles as Selles goes shit substitution mental. Alcaraz and Stuart Armstrong come off to be replaced by Elyounoussi and Moussa Djenepo. It always feels like self-sabotage. I know we’ve lost the game already and we are going down already but it’s like smacking supporters in the face, making them watch those two jokers. As if that’s not enough, off comes AMN to be replaced by Adam Armstrong.

Fulham fail to clear a ball and it drops to Sulemana on the edge of the box and he drags his shot across goal and wide. Fuck all happens for the rest of the game apart from Fulham substitute Solomon cutting in on the left-hand side and trying to curl one into the top corner but McCarthy is equal to it.  Fucking rubbish, again and we are finally mathematically down.

It’s probably about 40% of the original crowd left and the players are just standing around chatting to the Fulham players because that gives a chance for more people to leave before they go on Mike at half past efforts with knowledge the supporters. Down if you do and damned if you don’t I suppose. Personally, I decided at that point it was time to go.

The Fat Lady Sings

A completely useless flaccid performance to confirm our relegation to add to all the other completely useless flaccid performances that we’ve seen.  Fucking hell, what a load of shit that was.  An absolute piss boring first half followed by a second half capitulation and another round of my new favourite game show, “Ladies and Gentlemen, come on down and let’s play Selles Shit Substitutions“…. The object of the game is to make up to 5 substitutions and to make your team worse as many times as possible.  It was good that he brought on Adam Armstrong, Elyounoussi, Djenepo and Mara so they could actually be on the pitch when it was finally confirmed how shit we are.

Not that it really matters but the game itself had the most tediously dull first half with neither team looking like they were ever going to score but Fulham at least looking like a functioning team with some sort of idea how to pass the ball to each other and get it from one end of the pitch to the other. Saints had no clue and passed the ball about until they tried to go forward when they lost it.  We didn’t even try to hit the big target man upfront, hamstrung as we were by Selles defensive tactics yet again as Armstrong and Walcott were clearly reined in. No changes at half-time and the key two minutes of the game was when we had a goal correctly disallowed, closely followed by Fulham taking the lead through Vinícius.  Of course, we were never gonna win at that point to carry on till next week but we weren’t even going to draw either and the rest of the game was absolute fucking wank as Selles played his substitution gameshow and brought on mostly utter garbage. Moussa Djenepo had obviously been on speed at half time because he came on, ran around like an idiot, crashed into people, ran randomly offside and was his usual embarrassing self. Remember, we gave this guy a new contract at the start of the season when we had already watched him be shit for three years.

The second Fulham goal by Mitrović sparked a bit of a stampede for the exits as many people understandably couldn’t be arsed with the last 10 and couldn’t be arsed with the crocodile tears from players pretending to care. We all know the ones that care and there aren’t many of them.

Selles turned up in his milk tray man outfit today, winning in the fashion states and that’s all, as usual. Prick.  He bounced up and down on the touchline berating everybody and anybody all day. Once you notice it, you realise how fucking annoying it must be to be trying to concentrate on what you’re doing on the pitch when you have this fashion model in his first managerial job barking constantly like an irritating Jack Russell from the sidelines.

Fulham won the Championship last year and they were light years better than us. Even before they scored, they were the only team who passed the ball with any intent and they kept finding space because their players made intelligent runs off the ball.  

Sellers of course gave rare start to Paul Onuachu today and once again the team totally failed to play to his strengths. One cross came his way in the second half which he headed narrowly over, but other than that there was next to nothing. Not one cross for him to attack in the opening 50 minutes. We weren’t even playing long balls up from the back. Having said that we didn’t play to his strengths, his first touch is often dreadful, he is incredibly clumsy and very slow and his inclusion today probably explains why Selles shat himself and made Stuart Armstrong and Theo Walcott play as conventional wide midfielders in what was basically a 4-4-2 formation, old style. I guess he did that because Paul is not going to lead the press particularly well. I mean, we needed to be careful today because it wasn’t like we actually needed to fucking win or anything. Selles is a joke and the club right now is like a shit episode of the Muppet show.

It's a shame that he was partly, unluckily involved in Fulham’s first goal today but I was impressed with Lyanco.  He has personal pride in his performance and cares about doing well.  I certainly wouldn’t be against him being around next season and with a run of games, he might be a very good option next year.

Rasmus and Henrik Waiting for Metrics to Work in 2063

Now we are officially down, Sport Republic can stop deluding themselves that everything is okay and can get to work and find people behind the scenes to fill the senior positions that have suffered the exodus. Next season starts on the first week of August so we have 2 and a half months, about 11 weeks.  No time for fucking about, no excuses. Learn from your mistakes, draw a line under it, move on, get things done quickly.  In the aftermath of the game came a statement which didn’t really say much, just a promise that a further announcement was incoming that would say something.  Talk is cheap though.  The statement and the early activity as a result had better be good though because season tickets will be a hard sell next year.  Finding £500 to £800 isn't easy these days (is it Rishi?) and fans will need encouragement.  A decent manager appointment would of course, help massively.  I would suggest that appointing Selles would guarantee selling less than 10,000. 

Life is going to come at Sport Republic fast.  To give yourself an idea of how much work there is to be done before the start of August, imagine for a second that we had this manager and this squad of players in the Championship next season? Where do you think we would finish? I would suggest that if your answer is top half then you are wrong.

Next up is a trip to Brighton for a dead rubber – not for them though because they have Europa League places to chase whereas all we can get out of it is to blood a couple of youngsters to give the travelling fans something to look forward to.  We can’t move in the table, we are finishing last so there is no excuse for not doing so.

Just two dead rubbers to go.  Thank Fuck for That.

Premier League Match 17 -- Fulham 2 Southampton 1

 

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.

JWP Chips it Over 3 foot 2 Harrison Reed

Saints actually try playing some football in the Fulham half and this results in Adams being bundled over by Decordova-Reid just to the right of centre about 25 yards out. Perfect. The wall is set, Fulham have 4 foot 3 Harrison Reed on the right-hand side of the wall as JWP looks at it and bang… over the wall and Leno has made the mistake of thinking it’s going the other side and has absolutely no chance as it rips into the net. Get the fuck in there.

It’s still all Saints straight after the goal and JWP puts Edozie through, but Tete gets back to put in a decent block before he can shoot.  Jones make a decent change with Stuart Armstrong is on for Aribo, who has been shockingly bad. 

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.

Rasmus Demands Another Metrics Spreadsheet

It’s three games now under Nathan Jones in the league and we have scored from two free kicks and a penalty, so absolutely nothing from open play and there really isn’t gonna be much, playing this long ball shit. The number of times in the first half in particular that Che was backed into the centre half and watching the ball sail over his head through to the goalkeeper. That sort of shit football might work in the Championship or in League One, but it very rarely works in the Premier League and again, if Rasmus Ankersen is happy with us playing that brand of football, then we really should’ve appointed Sean Dyche, who of course has experience of Premier League football.  Even the opposition manager today, Marco Silva, said afterwards that Saints weren’t playing any football and there was only one team trying to win the game with positive football. He is dead right. 28% possession against Fulham. I’m not a big one for possession stats as they are not really important that 28% is alarmingly low and it’s not remotely surprising given the amount of times we just wafted the ball up the pitch in the general direction of Che Adams.

I don’t know what metrics Nathan Jones come out on top of to earn him this job but regardless of what they were, football in the Championship and League One isn’t the same as in the Premier League. In the same way that it’s highly unlikely that a player could step up from the Championship to the Premier League in a struggling team and hit the ground running (see Adam Armstrong for details).  It mad that we have appointed a manager who has zero experience of top-level football as a manager, and he never played top level football either, so what makes him qualified?

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.