Fulham v Pompey

Sadly, I missed the first half. I don't think we played all that well in the second, but it's nice to be on the other end of a right place, right time goal. At least we won, that's all that matters.

 

THREE POINTS!!! :banana: :banana: :banana:

I'll take an ugly win any day of the week and twice on Sunday...

 

Here is Greening's goal:

http://www.101greatgoals.com/videodisplay/4653544/

 

I'm glad we won. I'm pleased with Shorey's play, and Okaka shows promise. For some reason 1-0 scorelines against Pompey don't surprise me. I hope it's a good start to the second half of the season. Now let's get a road win.

 

Win is a win is a win for me. Good to see we the loans/buys paying off right away.

 

We played poorly in the first half, but really picked up our game in the 2nd. Even then, it wasn't a good Hodgson-Fulham performance, but it was enough.

Schwarzer - 7 solid game; even had some nice touches on dodgey back-passes

Kelly - 2 a shocker. It would be a 1, but he didn't score an own-goal. My biggest shock was that when Roy took him off after 55 minutes, he didn't replace him with the right back on the bench (Stoor), but instead brought in Chicago as DM and moved Baird back there. Horrible by Kelly and disheartening for Stoor (though both Baird and Chicago played well, so Roy was probably right).

Hughes - 7 solid, quiet performance, but did get a nice header on the ball.

Hangeland - 6 improved from his last few weeks; I sense he's almost recovered from his injury now

Shorey - 8 didn't put a foot wrong defensively and put in some very nice crosses into the box. I didn't miss Konch at all.

Baird - 6 solid game as both DM and RB

Murphy - 5 got overrun in the first half, but picked it up in the 2nd

Greening - 7 invisible in the first half but did a passable Dempsey impression in the 2nd, moving more in field and getting much more involved. Well taken goal, even if it should've been called back for offsides (Zamora)

Duff - 8 as expected, our most creative force on the pitch and made some great defensive moves as well.

Zamora - 8 he's not quite where he was before his injury, but he's really close now. He bossed their back line in the 2nd half and held the ball up nicely.

Okaka - 7 yeah, he missed a sitter, (header from 3 yards out) but he was very active and dangerous all night. Once he gets more time on the training pitch and develops understanding with his teammates, we won't miss AJ at all - he has pace, size, and touch - the Italian Jozy is a good descriptive (think in-form Jozy). Dempsey is going to love playing with him when he comes back because their attacking styles will go together so well.

Chicago (sub) - 6 solid performance

Nevland (sub) - 7 dangerous and active

Elm (sub) - 6 active and willing to help defend our box

[Edited to add Duff, whom I inexplicably forgot]

 

I went out and caught the replay after work last night. Considering we started 2 guys who have been with the club for less than a week, Greening saw the pitch for the first time in forever, etc, it wasn't that bad. We had chances, we threatened more than in the last two matches. There were a lot of good things in that performance we can build on.

For starters, Hughes, Hanger and the Aussie looked a lot more solid. The only thing Kelly did well was get forward a lot more than our fullbacks have lately. Other than that, his subbing off tells you all you need to know. How many times has Roy pulled a guy that early in the 2nd w/o injury? Shorey is getting more love than deserved imo, but he was very solid defensively. He and Greening gave the ball away quite a bit in the first half as they struggled to get on the same page. To be expected. Second half was much better. We still suck eggs defending set pieces.

In the middle, that was the closest I've seen Danny look to the '08-09 version in a long time. Greening sat out on the wing and didn't contribute much in the first half. In the second, he started playing toward center and he was much more involved. Once he did that, Shorey got further forward on the wing and became more involved in the offense. Duff was a sumbitch. He was everywhere like a man possessed and for my money was easily the man of the match. Baird was his usual pedestrian self (not that that's bad). While I love Chicago's defense, he is a bigger offensive liability than Baird. I get that limited options probably drove that decision, but I'd rather only see him come on with us in the lead.

Bob was Bob but I thought he struggled a little more to hold it up this time. Pompey knocked the ball off of him more than usual. He did get in several good positions to put a header on net and came pretty close on one. Nevland is so much better as the super sub. I hope we never start him again. Great hustle, created chances and I was so looking forward to saying he didn't make any stupid challenges (hear that Don?) and then in the 90th minute he came up limping after a typical piss poor, reckless Viking special. Elm looked good again as a sub. If we can keep the 4 forwards we have healthy, I don't think we'll miss Dio.

Which leaves us with Okaka. And Oh Shit! indeed. While you want to be cautious getting excited about 69 minutes against Pompey, he gave us a lot of reasons to be optimistic. The Jozy comparisons aren't bad but from this performance, Okaka looks like he's more athletic, has better skill on the ball, and has more quickness/is able to create his own offense. He's also far less timid in shooting. He reminds of Dempsey in that regard and I too found myself thinking Clint and Okaka could be lethal together. I was concerned with how much hustle we'd see, but he came out and worked so kudos for that. The only knock would be that while he was a force in the first half, he faded in the second quite a bit.

On the other side, outside of Piquionne, Boateng and O'Hara, Pompey really didn't look up for it. Much like the first meeting, Piquionne was their most dangerous player and I couldn't believe Grant took him off so early. Especially for the Watford Whiffer, Danny Webber. After we went up 1-0, they didn't look like they had much interest in levelling.

Nonetheless, it was good to watch another Fulham win over a couple of pints of Fullers ESB. Hopefully we turned a corner last night.

 

Roy's relief was palpable in his postmatch interview on Sky. Glad to see the lads got stuck in the second half and grinded out the result. Very rarely do the Whites get that big of break (Zamora was clearly offside on the goal) when it comes to the refs, but it's more than welcome. Huge 3 points, especially with that big group of teams sitting between 20-22.