Fulham at Middlesbrough

It'll be interesting to see how we perform at the Riverside after the sub par but not totally without hope performance against Southampton. I'm particularly anxious to see what difference having Betts back in goal makes. Our record with him starting versus Button has to be better, although I haven't done the math. And, we were starting to get our legs under us, league-wise, before the cup interruption. Since we haven't acquired a striker during the window yet, and aren't likely to until late, if then, it would be nice to see one or two of our current forwards finally a) get hot and go on a scoring binge and, b) stay healthy long enough to continue said scoring binge. And...I keep waiting, as I know many of you do, for StefJo and Cairney to get going as well. Again, I haven't done the research, but I'd bet their offensive stats are way behind this stage last season. Either Tom's still not 100%, or in a slump, or missing Aluko, or SOMETHING, or, well, I don't know what. Johansen just hasn't performed like he did last season, for whatever reason(s), which might explain why Celtic were willing to part with him. Either way, we've seen what both of these guys are capable of, and we need them to start playing like they did last season right now. Boro? They're a bit of a mess at the moment. Tony Pulis replaced Garry Monk who replaced, Aitor Karanka. Three managers in the space of, well, 2017. Sound familiar? With all that, they're still two points and two spots ahead of us in the table. Which means absolutely squat. I think we win this one.

 

I got your math right here!

Button, in Championship play, has a record of 6W, 8D, 6L (30%, 40%, 30%)
Bettinelli, in Championship play, has a record of 4W, 1D, 1L (67%, 17%, 17%)

Button has given up 1.35 goals per match
Bettinelli has given up 1.17 goals per match

Last year Cairney scored one goal every 317 minutes played. This year he has scored just one goal in all 1,426 minutes played. His pace on assists is also off, from every 412 minutes to every 713 minutes

Last year Johansen scored one goal every 294 minutes played. This year he has scored once every 381 minutes played. His pace on assists is also off, from every 403 minutes to every 954 minutes

Enough math! Let's put a sad performance against Southampton behind us and keep things rocking like we did against Ipswich!

 

First, two words for striker: Shefki Kuqi. Go get him.

Ah, a meeting of Europa/UEFA finalists from the not-too-distant past. Hopefully the manager carousel inflicts sufficient turmoil to allow the Whites to grab all three. Given the lethargic performance in the FA Cup, Fulham should be able to put that hot-mess behind them and come out with a fire this weekend. I too believe 3 points is a realistic result.

COYW

 

Due to the televised nature of the Southampton match, it's easy to be down on the squad at this moment. However, Fulham have gone 6-2-2 in their last 10 league matches which leads me to believe that I'm a glass half empty guy this season. Of course a lot of my feelings probably extend from the expectations that I had in August.

Boro have gone 5-0-5 in their last 10 and most recently scored 2 second half goals at Preston to erase a half time deficit. I think this will be a very even match (aside from Fulham's meaningless possession advantage) and Boro may get their first draw since October. I'll say 0-0 or 1-1 since Boro have averaged even fewer on-target shots per match (3.8) than Fulham (4.1).

 

Looks like Cairney’s questionable. Same knee, apparently, that he’s been having a problem with since the beginning of the season. Sorry folks, but this just don’t pass the smell test. If the club has been trying to nurse him through an entire season with an injury that requires surgery, that’s really bad.
If not, then I don’t understand.

https://www.getwestlondon.co.uk/spo...ews/fulham-captain-tom-cairney-doubt-14142036

 

I have no idea how FulhamTV works, but I'm guessing all you need is a laptop, a connection cord, and a password and you're set. Maybe it's the performance against Southampton that makes me thinking that we'll leave the Riverside w/no points, but not overly optimistic.

 

Yay! Hopefully we'll put in a better showing than against Southampton.

 

Past form is not our friend here (from whoscored.com)....

"Middlesbrough have kept a clean sheet in their last 4 home matches against Fulham in all competitions."​

But I'll be watching (thank you to those of you who brought this to my attention).

 

Could there possibly be a phenomenon called anti-Fulhamish? Because that, ladies and gentlemen, is exactly what we witnessed today at Boro. With another slow start, featuring multiple passes to the guys in the wrong shirts (well, that happened all day, actually), Sessegnon getting abused by Adama Traore and our "possession" game looking more like a pedestrian training ground drill, we should have been out of it by halftime. Rudy Gestede had a hat trick full of looks, only to piss every one of them away. Only some timely defending, some skill from Marcus and, let's be honest, some darn good luck (read: gaffes by them) kept the ball out of our goal. Really thought George Friend's challenge on Fredericks at 37' deserved a red, but he escaped with yellow. Nil-nil at the break was just, well, anti-Fulhamish, although we did perk up later in the half. Thought we were better in the second half, by quite a lot, actually, especially when Slava starting subbing. Kalas for Ojo seemed to work a little bit, then Rui Fonte for Kamara, who wasn't effective today. When Kalas pushed Martin Braithwaite down in our box, I thought it was a penalty. Fulhamish strikes again. But Geoff Eltringham swallowed his whistle. Don't know about you, but my jaw hit the floor. When Neeskens replaced Piazon at 85', his pace started to give them problems. But it surely looked to be headed to a nil-nil result which, given our poor opening, I'd have been happy with. Was stunned when 5 minutes of stoppage time went up. From where? And I was just as stunned when Assombalanga's clear chip softly arced goalward...and hit the bloody crossbar and bounced almost straight back onto the pitch! If it goes in, as it should've...Fulhamish. Right? Then...did Grant Leadbitter foul Norwood in the box? News flash...I. DON'T. CARE. We've been on the other end of dodgy calls (if this one even qualifies as such) in this division since we were relegated. Endured more than our share of them, including in the Prem, since losing the Europa League final in 2010. Do we still have issues with the high press? Yup. Do we still need a real striker? Of course. Do we need more consistent effort and execution from our performances? Absolutely. But I'll make no apologies for stealing this one and the several dozen more we're owed. All's fair in love and football. We'll know soon enough if this result gets us anywhere this season, but for now, I'm gonna savor it like a top shelf, slow sipping, fine Kentucky bourbon.

 

A few wishes...

I wish that Fulham wouldn’t wait until the 75th minute to start attacking.

I wish Norwood would make more attack minded passes. 95% (a unverified count) of his passes were to a defender or another midfielder.

I wish there was more consistency at the front. Kamara dominates for a couple games and then goes missing (though in his defense, the entire front line went missing) in this game.

And finally, I wish more matches were televised. I’ve really enjoyed being able to sit and watch the last two.

 

I only got to listen to the first half and the last 10 minutes of the match. Based on the highlights above I thought the refs got both the potential penalty on Kalas wrong and the penalty awarded Norwood wrong. However after watching the Fulham highlights this morning they had closer views on both. (maybe they showed this on ESPN?) On closer viewing Kalas was getting put in a headlock and pushed Assombalonga off of him to get free. He's got to be careful in that situation, but I think that was a fair call. On the other end Norwood did get his left foot stamped on which caused him to fall, so that was a fair call too.

If you listened to GJ he described Tony Pulis as "pig-sick" after the penalty kick. If you wondered what "pig-sick" looks like, here you go:


I'm not sure we deserved to win this won, but that happens sometimes. We've certainly had a few draws this season we deserved to win. This still wasn't anywhere close to the Huddersfield match from three years ago where we played down a man for 40 minutes, faced two PK's, and still ended up winning 2-0. That was the most undeserved win I've seen from Fulham.

Now we have a run of four matches against struggling teams before then facing Aston Villa. If we get a similar run of results over the next four as we've had over the previous four and then take Villa at Craven Cottage we are going to be in excellent shape heading into Spring.

 

In the top 8 and plugging along. I'm still not sure how much confidence I have in this squad to produce a run similar to last season in the second half of the year.

 

Not exactly highlights from Middlesbrough, but "Matchday Experience" footage that does include a couple minutes of game play:


I really wish Fulham would do videos like this (or allow their fans to do it for them). I guess I'll always be grumpy that we get nothing to share.

 

I suspect they ARE planning to do videos like this, which is probably why they're taking such a hard line against Fulham1879Fan. BUT...his stuff is no match for this kind of production. His is more cinema verite' from a fan's perspective in the stands and before and after on a typical matchday. This is more structured and VIP, like, pitch side, where nobody else can really go, except the benches, the linesmen and the ball kids...including, well, the ball kids and mascots. A normal fan can't go there. And a regular fan sure as hell can't shoot field level highlights with a professional grade video camera. 1879 is using his cell phone video camera. Only bad thing about this video is the position from which they shot the penalty. The cameraman was bird dogging the visitor's goal, which is exactly what he's supposed to do, given he works for the home club. But I do love floor and field level highlights. Only way you get a true perspective of how fast the game really is at the top level.