Luton Town FC v. Fulham

I'm eager to see Fulham get back to scoring multiple goals in a match and winning. Remember how much fun the Barnsley, Blackburn, West Brom, and Nottingham Forest games were? More of that please!

Fulham appears to be completely healthy with the exception of Cavaliero and Chalobah, so in other words, they should be at 100%. Antonee Robinson will be back after missing the Bournemouth match due to illness. I expect him to get the start since Bryan didn't have a breakout performance last weekend and I wouldn't be surprised to see Cairney start over Seri. I'd like to see Tete in rather than Odoi, but that is probably less likely.

Fulham has had three straight draws in the league and had a draw on their last visit to Kenilworth Road, but despite historical trends, Fulham should win. Three points would help squash those little doubtful voices that have started to pop up in my head over the last couple draws.

This one will only be on FFCTV and it starts at 10am EST on Saturday.

 

Crap. When’s the next international break so we can start playing better? Troubling that we can’t see out a 1-nil lead.

 

I went on A day trip and I didn't check the score until the early evening. Glad I waited so so long. This would have ruined my day.

 

The highlights:


I'm not sure if I'm reading too much into this, and I feel like a broken record, but once again when the conditions got terrible Fulham struggled. The second half of this match was played in a downpour. At points, there was so much rain on the camera lens that it was impossible to tell what was happening - everything looked like it was viewed through a crappy kaleidoscope. Seri and Wilson seemed to have the most trouble with the conditions. This is England in Winter so they need to figure out how to adapt. I was thinking they need to dribble more and try fewer intricate passes, but right after I had that thought Onomah dribbled into a dead end and turned the ball over in Fulham's half - so they need dribble better too.

Fulham looked in control of the match until just after scoring the first goal. After that they just couldn't maintain possession until into the second half. It felt inevitable that Luton was going to get a goal and pull level. Luton was maintaining a great press and dangerous counter attacking threat. Fulham's left side was opened up a couple times, but Luton just couldn't get a good cross in. Luton's goal came when Adebayo gave Ream a shove just before a free kick was taken so that he essentially had a free header on a well placed kick.

After Carvalho came on Fulham had a little bit more spark and I thought they might find a winner. The chance came when Muniz found himself with a great open look in the box. However instead of firing a shot inside the near post or centering it for Carvalho he gently rolled it straight at the keeper. So gently, that this great chance for Fulham didn't even make the cut for the highlights. Muniz again disappoints.

This one felt too much like other recent frustrating draws. Once again Fulham was a little unlucky when it was 1-0 that a handball penalty wasn't awarded, and once again Fulham was unlucky when a ball bounced around the line and didn't go in, but on the whole a 1-1 draw was a fair result.

The one piece of good news today is that Bournemouth lost against Blackburn so Fulham gained a point there. However with West Brom five points back and Blackburn six points back Fulham needs to start winning again soon to keep their automatic promotion spot.

EDIT: One thing I forgot to mention was GJ's close proximity to the Luton fans. It sounded like he was sitting right in the crowd. One guy behind him was particularly vocal and didn't care much for Mitrovic. He drowned out GJ at points with shouts of "WANKER! WAAAAAAANKER! WANKER!" directed at Mitro. When a Luton player went down in the box looking for a penalty GJ told the guy behind him to shut up. I'm glad he got out of there without a scuffle!

 

Yeah, draws are definitely the Debbie Downers of an unbeaten run.

 

And…don’t look now, but the Blackburn side we clobbered 7-nil in Lancashire back on Nov. 3rd? They’re unbeaten since, with only a 1-1 draw at Bristol City preventing it from being six wins in a row. Rovers are now 4th, one point behind West Brom, with a bullet.