FFC v. Leicester

The other team we’ve beaten this season is up next for the return fixture at the Cottage. Some would say our 1-1 draw with Liverpool at home was our best performance this season, but I’ll go with the 2-1 victory at the King Power on November 30th that briefly lifted us out of the the drop zone. The first time I started type this, I was watching the extended highlights of the butt whoopin’ Leeds United put on them Sunday in the East Midlands. I haven’t checked the numbers, but it seems that home field advantage has been mitigated by the pandemic.
But I digress.
We should have had a clean sheet at their place, but the win against a quality side was certainly welcome. They are still 4th, in fact, a point behind scousers and two behind ManUre. The only logical reason we should be able to hang with them is favorable matchups. Despite their Leeds drubbing and what I’m sure they’ll regard as a sub par performance against us, I think we scare them a little. We do matchup well with them, talent wise, position by position...except one. Jamie Vardy didn’t play against Leeds due to a supposed hernia issue. We kept him under check really well last time so, if he plays, he’ll should be highly motivated to prove that was a fluke...if he plays.
I’m going to be optimistic and predict a more consistent 90+ from our lads than what they gave at West Brom and we win 3-2 (although I really hope we don’t give up the two).

 

And this injury update from Brendan Rodgers:
Vardy, Ndidi, Fofana still out.

https://www.lcfc.com/news/2007586/rodgers-fitness-update-vardy-ndidi-castagne-fofana--morgan

 

I think the commentator in the West Brom match said that teams are doing better away from home this season, which is just unheard of.

 

I took off work for the last Leicester match and we won. So I'm doing it again.

 

One would think that facing Leicester City with six of their first team players injured would be advantageous. I'm hopeful that it will help the Cottagers today. We played them very well earlier in the season, but it is very hard to complete the double on any team in the Premier League, especially the team sitting fourth in the table.

 

0-2 HT....Sigh

 

Yeah. Not fun.

 

Well we didn't play bad, but we didn't play good either. So the score is sadly a fair result.

 

Welp, I was right about THEIR score. I only got to watch a chunk of the second half after we were 0-2 down. We managed enough possession, got the ball forward OK, but the technical ability in the final third was...sorry, I can't think of a strong enough word to describe it. Let's just say Pep's Barcelona we ain't. In fairness, nobody's like Pep's Barcelona, before or since, but we were the anti-BarcaPep. If they were the gold standard for final third offense in association football, we were the moths and rust version today. I kept thinking we could use some Tom Cairney magic between the center circle and the top of the 18, but he's still out. It seems that we can't deviate from the lineup that's done the best job of keeping the ball out of our own net in favor of more offense without impunity.
What next, Whites fans?

 

I didn't watch the match but was following along with the live updates. I think this post from Charlie Austin sums up things quite well though.

4:55
'Really poor'
Fulham 0-2 Leicester City


Charlie Austin

QPR striker on 5 live sports extra

Fulham have huffed and puffed - and got absolutely nowhere. They have been really poor. Watching on, that makes you worry. Where's the next goal coming from?

Brighton fans watching that won't be too worried about Fulham.

James Maddison was exceptional for Leicester tonight.​

 

The less said about these highlights the better. Ick.


And it should also be mentioned Brighton beat Liverpool. Fulham is 8 points behind 17th place Burnley.

 

That’s a lot of points.

 

Oh dear I don't know what good to make of this.

Leicester are better than I think we may give them credit for, but were still missing 4-5 starters. As such there are blaring alarms all over the place. Again we lumber and labor with little to show while opposition scores effortlessly in a blink. Again when we need to ratchet up our offense and take chances, we somehow get more plodding and have more possession.

Down 2-0 at HT at home, we netted zero shots on target in that 2nd half (we had one the whole game! From our CB!) Fans are starting to clamor for Scott to ditch the 5 at the back (we're getting overrun in midfield while providing no creativity going forward; not using our width), but we were worryingly as inept going forward when we went 4 at the back. I don't know if a new player like Maja fixes systemic issues like that.

Yes everyone else is in same situation, and the reasons for it are obvious, but something else affecting us is amount of games: there's been 13 in the past two months. That's nuts, even if you don't have a tiny squad that only really uses ~14/15 players like us. We need a break.

 

Aren't they still starting Jordan Henderson at CB?

In other news, our game in hand has been rescheduled to Wednesday, 2/17. It's at Burnley who are also at 21 matches played and are 8 points clear and where we haven't won since 1951

 

Feb away trips to Everton where we haven’t won at Goodison Park since 1975, Burnley since 1951.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMRrNY0pxf

 

Seems like 1975 was the last time Fulham won in the top flight.