Fulham vs. Bournemouth

Fulham hosts Bournemouth on Saturday at 10am EDT. The match will be on Peacock.

If there is one thing the majority of Fulham and Bournemouth fans will agree on, it is that we don't care much for Scott Parker as a Premier League manager. Although there is a little less drama without Parker around, it is still a very important match for two teams looking to make a statement about where they belong in the table.

Fulham is coming off of two difficult losses and will be looking to rebound. Meanwhile Bournemouth haven't lost since Parker's last match against Liverpool. This may look like teams headed in opposite directions, but I don't think it is quite that dire. Fulham have dealt with injuries, an early red-card, and head-scratching VAR calls in the past two matches. Meanwhile three of Bournemouth's last five matches were against the three teams currently in the relegation zone. I don't think things are as bad for Fulham as it seems and I don't think Bournemouth has had as dramatic a turnaround post-Parker as it appears.

Fulham will be without Tete and Kurzawa. A decision about Mitrovic is supposed to be made in the coming hours. I'd like to see Mbabu play at right back rather than DeCordova-Reid - either way I'm not thrilled with the options there. If he's healthy, I'd be happy to see Wilson start, but I'm guessing he'll still be on the bench.

Looking for a win that helps settle the nerves a little bit - and a win with a clean sheet would be even better!

 

This one feels huge to me. A win would certainly calm my nerves. I'll be watching.

 

Agree with @stlouisbrad. This one does feel big. No such thing as a must-win game at this stage of the season, but this one feels like it. I assume Mitro will at best be on the bench. No Tete. After the experiment with Bobby at RB, I'm thinking Mbabu will get a start tomorrow.

I'm expecting a pretty standard starting 11, except for Mitro and Kenny: Leno-Jedi, Ream, Tosin, Mbabu-Palhinha, Reed-Kebano, Pereira, James-Vinicius. On the bench: Mitro, Wilson, Bobby, Willian, Cairney, Onomah, Diop, Parkes, Rodak.

 

I was off the grid last week so I missed the BDR experiment. Hopefully the week of practice has resolved the situation - either with BDR better versed and practiced in the role or Mbabu stepping up his game.

This game does feel like it has increased importance - facing another recently promoted team at home after losing two straight. These are the matches that you can’t really afford to lose if you are going to stay up.

As well as the team has played, I’m starting to worry about the defense. Fulham have conceded the fourth most goals so far. They really need to tighten things up. Bournemouth have only scored 8, so this seems like a good opportunity to build confidence.

 

I think it is big. To have any realistic chance to beat the promotion-relegation yo-yo cycle we’re in, we’ve got to beat the newly promoted sides that came up with us. That’s especially true of this Bournemouth bunch who, as has already been extensively mentioned here, cut the cord with Scott Parker very early on. But, they’re undefeated in four since Gary O’Neil took over: wins over Forest and Leicester, draws against Wolves and Newcastle. This will be a tough result if we can get it.

 

Bobby at right back and Diop in for Tosin. Mbabu must be totally unconvincing in training. Disappointing.

 

You gotta be kidding me. Conceding in less than 2 minutes? Ugh.

 

Considering how poor we were defensively I suppose I should be thrilled with a point.

I think I'll make Tete a get well soon card. We need that guy back.

 

@stlouisbrad Beat me to it, Tete is vital. Nowhere near a tv this morning, so getting a point after falling behind twice isn’t a total disaster.

 

The highlights:


What a horrible start, but credit to the guys for immediately getting organized and fighting back. I felt confident that they would equalize, but it also felt like Bournemouth could just decide to score whenever they want so seeing them regain the lead wasn't a surprise either.

I was very disappointed to see DeCordova-Reid get the start of Mbabu and things went about as well on the right side as expected.

The second half subs made a big difference. Reed had a very disappointing first half - he didn't take advantage of opportunities he had on attack and he was partially at fault in both Bournemouth goals - so I was all for seeing Cairney come on instead. Cairney made a huge impact and helped Fulham take control of the second half. Willian was also an upgrade over James. The highlights don't convey this, but Fulham totally dominated possession in the second half and regularly had Bournemouth pinned back in their box. Unfortunately, this didn't translate into quality chances - Fulham had only four shots on target to Bournemouth's six, but Fulham took 19 shots and Bournemouth 10. The commentator made a good point that Mitrovic seemed reluctant to elevate because of his injury so there would be no towering headers from him today. That took a bit of punch out of Fulham's attack. Vinicius came on late, but rather than swapping him for Mitrovic, Pereira was pulled and I think that made Fulham even less threatening. As much as I like Cairney's play he did miss a golden chance to send Willian through on goal in injury time but instead put in a cross that was easily collected by the keeper.

Wilson was a sub later in the second half, but was pretty much invisible. I don't think Diop gave Fulham anything more than Tosin, although I did enjoy seeing the big guy score. He did have some dicey moments playing up from the back that a better team would have pounced on. Fulham was punished by VAR last week, but Ream in particular got a few VAR breaks in this one. Ryan Fredericks made a reasonable case that Ream pulled him down in the box and Ream also brushed the ball with his hand while going to ground in the box. Last week it feels like both of those would have turned into PK's against poor Fulham, but not this week.

A draw was a fair result in this despite the imbalance in possession time. Fulham is just incredibly weak on defense and when our top scorer isn't 100% it is going to be hard to get three goals for a win. Fulham really needs to get Mitrovic healthy or find some other way to score for a win or two out of the upcoming matches against Villa, Leeds, and Everton.

 

Our defense is starting to remind me of our past two PL relegated sides. Too soft. I think we need help in the back in January, and Marco needs an NFL-type defensive coordinator…or a co- or assistance head coach of defense, a la Buddy Ryan with the Ditka led Bears.

 

Perhaps Marco should try starting The Captain.
Couldn’t hurt, right!

https://www.fulhamfc.com//news/2022...ampaign=menu&utm_source=gc-app&utm_medium=ios

 

Given Cairney's injury history, I'm very worried it could hurt! My preference for now is too keep him as a super-sub when needed.

He did deserve MOTM though.

 

So the title of this video is "Are Jesse Marsch's Pants too tight" and while it does address that question, I'm posting it here because there is a bit before that question which demonstrates the 3-D chess level strategizing going on with Tim Ream during the Bournemouth match. I thought he got lucky with VAR, turns out he had Bournemouth right where he wanted them!