Just home, my minor observations: Fulham are jolly good at falling over. The ref was poor. He seemed to penalise us for every possible infringement but barely considered the blatant red for them. Why Washington? - the more I see of him the less I see the point. Once again we earned a point thanks to the excellent Smithies.
BTW haven't seen any of game so not really able to comment too much......but decent point by sound of it, would have taken that before kick off.... Oh and Finglas....I'm using the 25 year old David Seaman as the comparison not the keeper he went on to become...........glad you accept Smithies is a good keeper..... Safe journey home mate.
Happy with today as Fulham are a pretty well-organised team and pass it about. Thought Aluko was all over the place and kept our defenders busy. Ref was cr2p and Birch needs to stop acting like a Sunday league football thug. Positives Mackie Hollow ManningSmithies and mention for Bidwell. We run around closing them down well, even up to the last few minutes. Negatives We do lack quality. It's okay running around all day but this is football and you also need skill, otherwise we would have a team of Linford christies. Cilla needs to stop handballing it and Mackie needs to know the offside rule. Away Fans Foolham fans chanting "Aaaagh your s22t" to Alex Smithies when we are 1-0 up and he saved a penalty. But what is worse is that "Aaaagh" chant which was abandoned in the 90's and you only hear it from Foolham and Reading fans. Connection?....
Thought Washington did well myself. Sylla wasn't doing much and got himself a moronic yellow card. Washington hassled well and got a good shot away.
Two comments. Fulham were lightweight...they are not going up...and they were cheats...they thought they were too good for our...they weren't We were too lightweight...we would have won that with ease with Charlie playing Loved the passion, from the whole team, the coaching staff...and the fans...we are getting there.. Our youngsters can hack it...YES I really enjoyed going to HQ today. Thank you Ollie, Marc, team.
Well, Reading are hosting Fulham on Tuesday, so they can compete for bragging rights:- Whilst we call ourselves **** at Fulham.......
Ellers just touched on it. Love Mackie but would think by now his experience would allow him to be able to understand the offside rule. Lost count the amount of times he was caught offside today and only if he would look around him and hold of a fraction longer before making his run that he could turn some of those runs into goals rather that ref blowing the whistle on him
Apparently Holloway been less than complimentary about the ref....saying he thought the penalty decision was an embarrassing decision adding that they're all standing on the side line being judged and hopefully Mr Stroud will be judged too as that was an awful performance from a referee....... No doubt Olie will be getting a letter from the FA during the coming week.....
He's not wrong. You can see from Clive's reviews that he's in terrible form. He totally abdicated responsibility for the penalty and left it to a linesman with a worse view. His control of the whole game was awful and next week he'll just get another game.
A decent point I suppose, against a pretty good side. Holloway has found a way to play that is functional and effective, but not very attractive. No criticism though, he needed to stop the rot and he has done that. We do lack quality in the attacking third, though. Sylla is not very good and Mackie is just Mackie. Washington added something I thought, but we are desperately in need of a striker in the transfer window. As with the Reading game, possession statistics don't tell the real story. Playing the ball sideways and backwards inside your own half shouldn't count as possession. I found it amusing to watch their two big lump CBs passing to one another, then forwards to a midfielder who would give it straight back because we had closed down all of their outlets. Fulham have quality players in Cairney and Oluko, but they also have some duffers. Fat-boy Chris Martin was joined by fatter-boy Matt Smith at the death. Surely the most immobile front two in professional football. For our part Smithies was excellent again (6 out of 10 penalties saved for us), Mackie was admirable for his work-rate and Lynch was tough as nails, but MOM has to go to Manning. How could we have thought of letting him go?
We'll be getting the failure to control your players charge as well for the handbags after Manning was pushed over I expect.
I watched the game today, first time for a very long time. Being down here in Cornwall earning very little not easy getting to a game. Nor is it easy to watch on TV when you can no longer afford Sky. We bought this Christmas a NOW TV box which allows me to pay for view for 24 hours of Sky sports sadly wanting to watch our game today gives you very little else in 24 hours. But I did watch the Rs. However I was pleased by today's game, we seemed to have some team spirit, we tried hard and for their league position Fulham for all possession where rubbish. Manning is certainly a battler, he seems to never give up, And Jamie well he tried hard, might not always deliver but he kept us in the game. I sat on the edge of my seat for 90 minutes with my heart racing I think maybe I shouldn't watch the Rs play live! Should have added Smithies was amazing today!
I have to disagree about Washington. Sylla was off the pace today but as soon as he was replaced by CW our ability to hold the ball upfield disappeared and the pressure Fulham were able to apply grew significantly. Washington simply isn't tall or physical enough for this league.