Jack and Loz at the Cottage - Blog 204

Date: 20th December 2021

Opposition: Sheffield United

Score: 0-1

Fulham goal scorers: remember when we had them? And they were really good?

Weather: very cold in the second half

Atmosphere: very p***ed off in the second half

MOTM: you’re kidding, right?

Drinks: we got to the ground early and enjoyed a couple of glasses of Chateau Fulham on the banks of the Thames. This was easily the best part of the evening and we will probably do it again

On Monday night, Fulham could have got back to winning ways, reasserted their dominance in the Championship and gone 5 points clear at the top, all just in time to allow their long-suffering fans a relaxed and peaceful Christmas.

It was always going to be a slightly odd Matchday with the new Plan B restrictions, and we had visions of chronic queues, chaotic concourses and people missing the first half of Fulham’s festive victory. But in a reversal of the usual pattern of things at the Club, the organisation was excellent and the football was dire.

This was Fulham’s worst game since the trip to Coventry. It was a match at home, with a fully fit squad, with no adverse weather conditions and a referee who wasn’t grappling with an existential crisis. In other words, there are no mitigating circumstances for the result or the performance.

There are no redeeming features either. Literally nothing good happened at all.

Mitro was so heavily marked that he is spared some criticism but if you’re the most prolific striker in the country, you’ve got to do better with that chance at the end. And if there were 3 men on Mitro, shouldn’t that have left the other attackers free? But no, Kebano regressed to his “good as an impact sub” phase from about 4 years ago while Harry Wilson regressed to the phase he was in earlier in the season when he’d had a bang on the head.

We couldn’t work out who out of Harrison Reed, Fabio and Seri was meant to be playing number 10 but whichever it was, they weren’t doing it well and when our actual number 10 came on, he didn’t do it any better. To be fair to Fabio, he tried to be creative for about 20 minutes then gave up. To be fair to Seri, his hair still looks extremely nice.

As regular readers will know, our back 3 have translated into the Triangulo do Ruina this season. This simply means we are a doomed defensively but with extra grilled sardines. The third minute of the match produced one of the Triangulo’s worst ever moments. In the Hammersmith End, we could all see it coming: a United player allowed to drive like a…… er, Blade from one end of the pitch to the other. Seri didn’t tackle him, Tosin didn’t tackle him, Ream didn’t tackle him and even at the last second we were thinking, “it’s ok - Rodak will save the shot which we’ve all known has been coming for the last 3 minutes.” But Rodak flapped, flailed and flopped to the floor. And the ball flew into the back of the net.

Rodak redeemed himself later, partly by keeping the scoreline respectable and partly by throwing his toys out of the pram in a fairly spectacular way in the second half.

As for the full backs, Kenny Tete at least tried a few crosses but for a player of his calibre this was a below-average outing. As for Antonee Robinson…..no, we can’t go there. We just can’t.

Overall, the team was sooooooooo slow. They even gave the ball away slowly. They waited for a pass to come to them rather than going to meet it - something most footballers learn to do aged about 10. And the attacking speed was worse than we experienced even in Scott Parker’ cardigan-wearing twilight weeks. You’re never going to score if you crawl along with the ball, allowing all 11 opponents to get behind it. Wasting opportunities with short corners, badly taken free kicks, weak shots and a hesitancy to shoot only compounds the problem.

After the substitutions, Fulham’s line-up must have been the most attacking the Championship has ever seen. And yet we still couldn’t score. The Strong-Man and the Samba Dancer aren’t a natural double act and Mitro and Muniz barely linked up at all. Admittedly, the last 10 or so minutes were livelier than the rest but we should have been playing with that level of attacking intent all match. As we know from previous results, it’s ok to concede the odd goal when you’re scoring 3 or 4 in response.

Not only was all this frustrating and worrying but it’s also bizarre. What has happened to this team over the last few games? Where is the excitement we saw against Stoke? Where is the exuberance we saw at Blackburn? Where, even, is the grit that produced the equaliser against Bournemouth? Where have all the goals gone???

The players look flat, disjointed; all out of ideas and energy. Silva said they were “anxious” but why? What have they suddenly got to fear? Is it so hard to be on top when you’re used to being the underdog?

In contrast, United looked fast, sharp and determined to win at more or less any cost. They must have been amazed and how cheap the victory was. And future opponents will have watched that match with growing optimism. Fulham have lost their way. We’ve lost our flair and our mystic. We’ve lost our sterling Silva battle armour. We’ve become predictable, easy to play against. Easy to beat.

Random musings:-

- the United fans dressed as Father Christmasses looked great

- Bobby brought a hot water bottle to one of the ball boys in the second half

- we don’t think Chalobah has ever been clapped while warming up before - he looked bemused

- Muniz acting as ball boy was endearing but it would have been better if he was picking the ball out of the net rather than the crowd

- what on earth was the formation after the Robinson/Muniz sub? The players didn’t seem to know either

- mask wearing in the ground was good but it’s got to be said: we risked Omicron for that.

On a serious note, we were horrified to read about the racist abuse Neeskens Kebano experienced overnight. We know all true Fulham fans are right behind Neeskens and we hope the culprit is caught and punished

We are now at the midway point of the season, coinciding almost perfectly with the winter equinox. The shortest day. The longest, bleakest night. But we have played every team in the league and come out on top. There have been big wins and big scores and big thrills. We’ve made Championship football look easy, stylish and exciting. But something has gone awry. Something’s not quite right.

We head into Christmas top of the league. But it’s going to be a fight to stay there.