Fulham at Wolverhampton

The Wolves have had a horrible year so far. On Saturday they manged to get their first win since September scoring two goals vs. a 10-man QPR squad. They currently sit two points outside of the relegation zone. They did manage to beat both Reading and Newcastle earlier in the year, but things have been bleak since then. Also on the plus side for us we'll likely face 2/5ths of last year's horrible Fulham defense: goal-post killah, Richard Stearman and goalie Andy Lonergan who came in last week after their starting keeper suffered an achilles injury. Given all of that Fulham should be looking to get 3 points from this one.

 

Hoping that we don't go Fulhamish thus weekend. I'm sure Slava will be warning them all week against a let down. It's going to be up to the leadership on the squad to get the lads ready to go get those 3 points because Wolves at home won't be giving them for free.

 

This should be 3. And if it's not, it might just be the reason this club isn't ready to compete for the top 6

 

Starters appear to be the same as against Reading (and why not?). Don't know about the bench, but it would seem Matt Smith and Michael Madl have gone MIA. And of course, no Woodrow.

 

So I forgot that Stearman is on loan from us! Obviously that means he won't be playing. Lonergan is injured so we won't see him either. Their starting keeper is injured, so they are down to their third-string goalie today.

 

Yeah, third string keeper starting, fourth choice keeper is the backup.

 

Sadly there is a reason why the word Fulhamish exists. Not quite a classic Fulhamish result since we did eke out a point, but it did feel all too familiar.

 

I don't know whether to be glad we didn't lose, or mad we didn't win. A maddening day, to be sure, but if we end up making the playoffs by a point.....

 

Highlights (that likely won't last long):


I've said it before and I'll say it again: Bettinelli should start. Button was in position to stop all four shots and whiffed on all of them. I don't expect him to stop everything within arm's reach, but even one out of four would have won the day.

Cairney's goal was very nice and Ayite's 100% effort to snatch a point at the death is greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks Micah for posting the highlights, I'm with you on Betts. For a 4-4 match the Wolves gk had a few really nice saves. Without going back and looking at all the results of the season, it seems there has been more than a few points saved late. Hopefully they'll be meaningful late Spring, but up 3-1 feels like 2 points lost. Will say that everyone at Molineaux sure got there $'s worth.

 

I'm not sure how they even got that fourth goal in without hitting either 1. the post or 2. Button's face. Didn't seem like there was much defense at all in the match.