Hey! Another blog incoming, this is as the title suggest a Transfer Window Preview where I'll talk about a very important window for us as a club- I'll combine incomings as well as likely outgoings with a combination of media speculation and hopes to give us the best chance of launching an assault on the Top 6.
Incomings
Matt Ritchie (Bournemouth)- I was talking about signing him in the Summer and of course he's gone on to have the most assists in the League and be generally good. There's been links in the media quoting a fee of £4million for him and as I'll discuss later we should have that coming in from the sale of one player so the money- and financial fairplay implications won't be an issue. In fact the only issue I can see as to why we wouldn't be able to sign him would be his desire to leave a team that have an almost guaranteed spot in the Playoffs for a team who's massive aspirations as it stands will be to creep into 6th. With Kacaniklic coming back (no section for him as its a recall) Ritchie would provide the perfect Right-Sided player so we can fit Kaca into a traditional 4-4-2 that'll suit both.
Lee Chung Yong (Bolton)- If we don't sign Matt Ritchie we should definitely explore other options with regard to a Right Winger. LCY is another player I've been harping on about for a long time on this blog and is a player I'd very much like to see in a White (and grey striped with random orange bits) shirt. Again he would provide a definite balance to the team, and in comparison to Ritchie probably a bit more pace however I would still prioritise Ritchie as this season he's proven himself to be more effective and when we're pushing for the Top 6 we need effective players- not to say LCY isn't, just less so. Although there isn't a quoted fee for LCY like there is Ritchie I can't imagine he'd cost more than £3 Million so would be a very viable option for us and with Ruiz 99% going (more later) the traditional 4-4-2 is looking to be the obvious option as such a quality right-sided player is required, another option we could look at is Boros Albert Adomah or another alternative that would qualify under the "Quality Right-Mid" umbrella, and this need was all but confirmed when we played Fofana on the Right against Brighton.
Speaking of Fofana...
Seko Fofana (Man City)- Yes, this counts because his loan expires on January 31st. On the one hand as I've referred to earlier with Bryan most likely going and us going to a 4-4-2 to properly incorporate Kacaniklic- Fofana's spot may be under threat which would mean extending his loan becoming unnecessary. However, if City were happy for him to be part of a rotation system and not being a guaranteed starter we could really use Fofana in our push to get as high up the table as possible. He's proven in the games against Leeds and Sheffield Wednesday his undoubted quality and a midfielder of his ilk will most definitely be a good option to have. As I keep saying the most likely scenario we go to is a 4-4-2 and (injury notwithstanding) Christensen and Parker shouldn't be dropped under any circumstances, however as we've seen in the Championship the games do come in massive clumps sometimes and we need Parker to be on top of his game every time he steps on the pitch so we will have to rotate him out for some midweek games/weekend games which may be deemed a lower priority/we can win without him.
Chris Baird (West Brom)- The signing of Baird will give us a very versatile option. We've seen with the Hoogland injury and Kay Vosers sudden death we've been left with Zverotic and Grimmer as our Right-Back options, while Grimmer has played well on occasion he's also shown his level of inexperience at this level and doesn't look entirely comfortable- yet. Signing Baird, who can play Right-Back as well as Centre-Back and Holding Midfield would be a good way to add experience to the team as well as signing someone who understands what Fulham is about already, and is willing to fight for the badge on the front- not the name on the back. As with Fofana we will need to rotate Parker sometimes so Baird could also fill in at Centre-Mid when we need to do that if needed and the same goes for Defence. Wages would be an issue, and I've seen some people saying they would see it as a step back re-signing someone but we definitely need to add experience to the team as going into the run-in of the season we'll need to keep cool heads if we are in and around the Playoff spots.
Kyle Naughton (Spurs)- As with Baird he will provide a good Right-Back option, and he will be a very good Right-Back and would definitely be a good addition to the team and with DeAndre Yedlin coming back to Spurs in January (work permit permitting) Naughton will very much be surplus to requirements at Spurs. If you look at an "everyone fit" scenario at the minute I'd rank Hoogland as our number one Right-Back- but I'm still yet to be convinced by him in a defensive capacity. His impressive goal tally aside he hasn't been a good "Right-Back" in my opinion and his lack of pace is definitely an issue. Then we see Grimmer who as I've already said has impressed- but is still showing clear signs of inexperience and if we are serious about pushing for the Playoffs we need a Right-Back who's fully ready now, which Naughton definitely is, another option I've seen discussed is Chris Gunter who would also fulfill the role just as well and either would really be acceptable.
Freddie Sears (Colchester)- This is a link I've seen recently and is one of the weird rumours that could be true, but you don't see any solid reasoning as to why they would be. Sears was one of the most hotly touted Youth Players not so long ago, but because of a number of circumstances his career has largely stalled. Despite Colchester's position Sears has still shone scoring over 10 Goals already. As I said though, I don't see a reason as to why we would sign Sears- and why he would want to sign for us in all honesty. As I'll write about later I'm not giving much credence to the McCormack Rumours and I think Hugo will stay until at least the Summer and with Woodrow and/or Dembele, Sears wouldn't even be guaranteed a spot on the bench.
Contrary to what most people believe, I don't think we should be prioritising a Centre-Back. In an "everyone fit" scenario I think we have a really good back four with the addition of a Right-Back;
Naughton, Bodurov, Amorebieta, Stafylidis
I think that back four is easily Top 10 worthy and possibly Top 6 and with Shaun Hutchinsons resurgence in the last few games we have a lot of different options that will be good depending on the circumstances with regard to opposition and injury from Hutchinson and of course Burn.
Outgoings
Bryan Ruiz- Perhaps the most obvious outgoing we have this January is Bryan. I don't think any logical Fulham fan expected Bryan to have pulled on a Fulham shirt again- especially after the World Cup he had. But, as such we've added another 3 Months to Bryans Fulham tenure but I can't see it becoming 5+. If the media is to be believed Werder Bremen are in for him again and I'd happily accept anything north of £4million for him as I highlighted with Matt Ritchie that'll give us a decent amount of money (assuming we reinvest it) to get a suitable replacement.
Lasse Vigen Christensen- A Common theme for these next few will be "I Can't see it happening" but as there have been links made I'm almost obligated to talk about it. In Christensens case Aston Villa was the main link I've seen- and I'm sure there have been some others. However, I Can't see it happening- considering Christensens contract runs until 2017 it would have to take an extraordinary bid to take him off our hands. However, considering how well Kit knows Christensen and vice versa- and Christensen not being guaranteed first team football would mean it would have to be a special set of circumstances for LVC to not be in a Fulham shirt come February.
Ross McCormack- Opening gambit for this is I'm not putting any validation to these rumours, but I would be wrong to completely ignore them given the fact they're rumours that have come out from the Papers- which is more than some of the other players I'll have discussed in this blog. I saw two different stories, one that Derby were preparing a bid- which I highly doubt given Derby's financial constraints and we were willing to listen to offers from Premier League teams for McCormack, which is more likely but teams that would actually benefit from McCormack in the Premier League would most likely not be able to afford him.
Hugo Rodallega- I saw some links this week, of Rodallega going to a La Liga team. However, once again I don't see a likely scenario where we get rid of Hugo and where Hugo would want to go. He loves being loved, and with the way he's currently playing (despite his recent dip) with a team thats partially built around him with a solid partnership with McCormack in the City of London where presumably his family is settled it would have to be an extraordinary set of circumstances for us to sell him- and for him to want to go.
Dino Fazlic- Yes, he still exists. A Grand Total of 0 Competitive minutes for us says it all- when he couldn't get a minute with "his" ridiculous rotation policy it says a lot for him as a player and I would expect him to be sold for a nominal amount, loaned out or simply released at the very latest this summer.
Mark Fotheringham- What to say about him eh? Unfortunately he did get minutes with "his" ridiculous rotation policy to the detriment of the team and my sanity. As with Fazlic I would expect us to get to sell, loan or release him by the Summer- and I would expect a Low End League 1 or any League 2 team to want him.
Adil Chihi- Despite Shahid Khans Lamborghini exploits, I can't see Chihi being a Fulham player for much longer. His cameo against Cardiff being his sole appearance for the club and I would expect us to sell him for a nominal fee to free up wages and squad space..
Kay Voser- Contrary to some reports, he didn't die on his way back from the Reading game despite not being seen since. With Zverotic, Grimmer and Hoogland already above him in the pecking order with the potential addition of a Right-Back there simply isn't room for Voser and as with the four names preceding I expect we'll sell him for a nominal fee in order to free up squad space and wages.
Thomas Eisfeld (Loan)- Despite Eisfeld coming in from Arsenal in his minimal appearances for the club he's far from impressed, and with the other midfield options we have- and the further options we have potentially coming in I can't see a scenario where someone like Eisfeld, who does have a decent pedigree about him being happy to play for the Reserves/U21s and I would expect us to Loan him to a League 1 team or abroad as he is still relatively young- and he has shown enough quality the times I've seen him play for Arsenal to make me think he has something that could add to the team.
Adam Taggart (Loan)- Taggart is a highly rated prospect, and with the right set of circumstances he could be in the first team. However with the Hugo and McCormack partnership currently flourishing with Woodrow and Dembele on the bench I can't see a set of circumstances where Taggart slots into the first team this season. As such I'd loan him out to a League 1 team to get proper match experience in English Football this season.
Chris David (Loan)- Similar to Taggart, Chris David is a player who is highly rated- but for a variety of reasons he hasn't factored into the first team plans under Kit. However, a player of David's quality is too good to simply get rid of as such I'd loan him out- most likely to the Eredivisie where he can develop his game.
Patrick Roberts (Loan)- This might be contrary to what some people think, but I don't see Pat Roberts as being ready yet. Yes, he has undoubted dribbling ability and general talent- but he's still very naive in a football sense and needs to streamline his game a great deal before he's ready to play a regular part in the Fulham team and a loan to a team in League 1 that plays "good" football would enable this development- as Roberts sitting on the bench isn't doing anyone any favours.
There are some other players who I would loan out if we were to bring in some of the players I suggested, for example if we do bring in Kyle Naughton I'd loan out Grimmer to further his development with Hoogland providing Right-Back cover for us and if we hit another injury crisis we can just recall Grimmer as we did in November
Most of these players are surplus to requirements, and between getting rid of at least 75% of these players and bringing in a minimal amount of quality players once we come out of this window we'll hopefully have a more streamlined squad with quality options.
My Hopeful Team come February (Everyone Fit)
Bettinelli
RB, Bodurov, Amorebieta, Stafylidis
RM, Christensen, Parker, Kacaniklic
McCormack, Rodallega
Bench:
Kiraly
Hoogland (Potentially coming in to play as a DM if holding onto a lead)
Hutchinson
Fofana
G.Williams
Hyndman
Woodrow
This team will provide us with the best chance of getting to the Playoffs in my opinion and if we were to have this team and with further options of players like Burn, Dembele and Zverotic we'll have a good depth in almost all of the areas of the team and give us a really good chance of stealing a Playoff spot. While the team quoted above is a long shot, its not entirely beyond the realms of possibility.
Thanks for reading as always, I'm of course open to other suggestions/alternatives there are of course some other players that would be on the outgoing list but these are the notable ones in my opinion and with a Fulham transfer window theres always a signing that nobody has heard of or anticipated so we need to brace ourselves for that one. Thanks again, I haven't made my mind up as to when I'm going to put this out on New Years Eve or New Years Day so either way Happy New Year.
Wednesday 31 December 2014
RAW Review- 29th December
Hello! Its my last RAW Review of the year, and with the promise of The Ascension laying the groundwork going into the last RAW of the year you were expecting fresh new gimmicks to enter the New Year in style.
E&C, Brock and Heyman, Cena, Rollins Segment
Theres no point praising the chemistry E&C have when on the mic together, but they did a good job setting up the rest of the night with their match announcements and in turn setting up the rest of the segment. The Heyman Promo was good, and was also a good way to foreshadow the Main Event segment with regard to Edges medical issues- although apparently all of us didn't get the memo King did that said Christian was retired as well. The Cena promo was- well a Cena Promo I did like the fact he suckered Brock in via Heyman as I've always thought that should be done more. Brock retreating was a good way to set up the angle we'll be getting for the first month of 2015 as they'll want to make us believe Cena could in fact win at the Rumble and having the Heel back away is Booking 101.
Dolph Ziggler v Rusev
Firstly, Where was the nudity I was promised?! Its not like WWE ever fail to deliver on their promises though so I'll write it off. They could have made the finish of the match a tiny bit less obvious by not mentioning the word "Pinfall" in relation to Rusev every 5 Seconds- but what we got before that was a really good back and forth match, and probably Rusevs best match to date. Dolph is continuing to deliver on a nightly basis and if he can keep getting good matches out of the "WWE Guys" he won't be allowed to be ignored for much longer for a mega-push much in the way Bryan was around this time last year. Again, Booking 101 with Rusev retreating from Ryback and it was a good way to get Ryback over considering he's more than likely going to either tap or pass out at the Rumble.
Ryback Promo
The Team of Bookers the WWE has must have heard Rybacks Talk is Jericho Podcast and thought "Yeah, We could fill some time with that".
Natalya v Nikki Bella
Tyson Kidd got TV Time, so its alright by me.
The Usos v The Miz's
This match was surprisingly good, I don't agree with the outcome but the means definitely outweighed the ends in this case. I thought these two delivered a really good match where the False-Finishes actually meant something because of the expectations surrounding the match with regard to The Miz's going over. However, as I said I really don't agree with the outcome- The Miz's do have a rematch clause and they'd better have Naomi turning on The Usos when that comes about or this whole angle will have been a waste, and the only thing coming out of it will have been the most stale Tag Team in the WWE getting the Belts back.
Cesaro Promo/Cesaro v Bad News Barrett
I loved the Cesaro Promo, if it hadn't of been for him fluffing his lines at the very end I'd have ranked it as one of the better promos of the whole calendar year. You always hear people are "good" at Promos say every Promo has a kernel of truth- and this was most definitely the case here and I'm just hoping the fluff at the end doesn't detract from what preceded it with regard to "the office".
I'd have held off on Bad News Barrett coming back until the Rumble where he would have gotten a good pop when he entered. But I understand with how thin the current roster is- especially on the babyface front they probably couldn't have done so. The match itself was relatively short- and you have to wonder whether the Promo Cesaro cut, and then the manner in which he was dispatched was a message to the IWC.
Jack Swagger v Luke Harper
Both of these guys are good in-ring workers, but giving them a multiple segment match with absolutely no build to it- especially when the Cesaro-BNB was short was idiotic. It didn't help the finish was completely telegraphed baring in mind who Swagger has lost to recently, making the false finishes not mean anything and that detracted from the match. Another thing that detracted from the match was the crowd seemingly didn't realise it was going on they were so quiet.
Roman Reigns v Seth Rollins
If any further proof was needed with regard to whether Roman was ready for the mega-push he is supposedly in line for, this was it. I don't mind rest-holds when they're used right, and perhaps it was understandable when you reads the story about Roman wrestling a match earlier in the night and then travelling to RAW- but the match simply wasn't good enough. The overly enthusiastic Big Show commentary didn't do much for it either- but it was a pretty mediocre match, and the finish DIDN'T EVEN MAKE ROMAN LOOK STRONG.
Daniel Bryan Promo
You can't help but compare this to the Mark Henry Promo we got in 2013, and in that regard it wasn't as good- it simply wasn't. I didn't get roped into this promo like I did the Henry one, but I think that might have been a direct consequence of the Henry one. Thats not to say the Promo didn't hit its marks, and if they had been the other way around I'm sure I'd be saying the same about the Mark Henry Promo. It was good to hear Bryan is ready to compete again, but the chances of him winning the Rumble are pretty slim- and I can see Roman eliminating Bryan as another "message" to the IWC.
The Ascension v The Miz's
I don't know why, perhaps because the debut was in the penultimate segment so we had the full night to anticipate what would happen- but I was expecting so much more from The Ascensions debut than a throwaway squash match, but what would a WWE Main Roster Debut be if you couldn't bitch about it after?
John Cena in "The Negotiator 2"
So The Authority basically wanted Christmas Off and then they got Rollins to do what he could have done to pretty much every guest host- the laptop aside, and force Cenas hand. This was perhaps the most anti-climactic way to bring The Authority back, but bringing them back for Mania season hopefully means we'll see the final end to the angle at Mania- as I originally suggested and used as the reason as to why Team Cena wouldn't win at Survivor Series. This was the first time in a while they've properly had Cena come off as the Babyface the WWE want him to be, and they did it by putting him in a "Rock and Hard Place" situation- and Rollins came off as the perfect heel from this segment, and it was reinforced by his "You Don't Know me very well, I'll kill him anyway" line.
Overall this RAW finish aside was fresh, exciting and really rather good- especially when you contrast it to some of the RAWs we've had recently that have been completely awful.
Thanks as always for reading, this is my last RAW Review of 2014 so I'd just like to say thanks to everyone who's read and shared since I started this blog in August and I hope you'll continue doing so in 2015. So have a Happy New Year, and bare in mind we can go back to missing the first 20 Minutes of RAWs now!
E&C, Brock and Heyman, Cena, Rollins Segment
Theres no point praising the chemistry E&C have when on the mic together, but they did a good job setting up the rest of the night with their match announcements and in turn setting up the rest of the segment. The Heyman Promo was good, and was also a good way to foreshadow the Main Event segment with regard to Edges medical issues- although apparently all of us didn't get the memo King did that said Christian was retired as well. The Cena promo was- well a Cena Promo I did like the fact he suckered Brock in via Heyman as I've always thought that should be done more. Brock retreating was a good way to set up the angle we'll be getting for the first month of 2015 as they'll want to make us believe Cena could in fact win at the Rumble and having the Heel back away is Booking 101.
Dolph Ziggler v Rusev
Firstly, Where was the nudity I was promised?! Its not like WWE ever fail to deliver on their promises though so I'll write it off. They could have made the finish of the match a tiny bit less obvious by not mentioning the word "Pinfall" in relation to Rusev every 5 Seconds- but what we got before that was a really good back and forth match, and probably Rusevs best match to date. Dolph is continuing to deliver on a nightly basis and if he can keep getting good matches out of the "WWE Guys" he won't be allowed to be ignored for much longer for a mega-push much in the way Bryan was around this time last year. Again, Booking 101 with Rusev retreating from Ryback and it was a good way to get Ryback over considering he's more than likely going to either tap or pass out at the Rumble.
Ryback Promo
The Team of Bookers the WWE has must have heard Rybacks Talk is Jericho Podcast and thought "Yeah, We could fill some time with that".
Natalya v Nikki Bella
Tyson Kidd got TV Time, so its alright by me.
The Usos v The Miz's
This match was surprisingly good, I don't agree with the outcome but the means definitely outweighed the ends in this case. I thought these two delivered a really good match where the False-Finishes actually meant something because of the expectations surrounding the match with regard to The Miz's going over. However, as I said I really don't agree with the outcome- The Miz's do have a rematch clause and they'd better have Naomi turning on The Usos when that comes about or this whole angle will have been a waste, and the only thing coming out of it will have been the most stale Tag Team in the WWE getting the Belts back.
Cesaro Promo/Cesaro v Bad News Barrett
I loved the Cesaro Promo, if it hadn't of been for him fluffing his lines at the very end I'd have ranked it as one of the better promos of the whole calendar year. You always hear people are "good" at Promos say every Promo has a kernel of truth- and this was most definitely the case here and I'm just hoping the fluff at the end doesn't detract from what preceded it with regard to "the office".
I'd have held off on Bad News Barrett coming back until the Rumble where he would have gotten a good pop when he entered. But I understand with how thin the current roster is- especially on the babyface front they probably couldn't have done so. The match itself was relatively short- and you have to wonder whether the Promo Cesaro cut, and then the manner in which he was dispatched was a message to the IWC.
Jack Swagger v Luke Harper
Both of these guys are good in-ring workers, but giving them a multiple segment match with absolutely no build to it- especially when the Cesaro-BNB was short was idiotic. It didn't help the finish was completely telegraphed baring in mind who Swagger has lost to recently, making the false finishes not mean anything and that detracted from the match. Another thing that detracted from the match was the crowd seemingly didn't realise it was going on they were so quiet.
Roman Reigns v Seth Rollins
If any further proof was needed with regard to whether Roman was ready for the mega-push he is supposedly in line for, this was it. I don't mind rest-holds when they're used right, and perhaps it was understandable when you reads the story about Roman wrestling a match earlier in the night and then travelling to RAW- but the match simply wasn't good enough. The overly enthusiastic Big Show commentary didn't do much for it either- but it was a pretty mediocre match, and the finish DIDN'T EVEN MAKE ROMAN LOOK STRONG.
Daniel Bryan Promo
You can't help but compare this to the Mark Henry Promo we got in 2013, and in that regard it wasn't as good- it simply wasn't. I didn't get roped into this promo like I did the Henry one, but I think that might have been a direct consequence of the Henry one. Thats not to say the Promo didn't hit its marks, and if they had been the other way around I'm sure I'd be saying the same about the Mark Henry Promo. It was good to hear Bryan is ready to compete again, but the chances of him winning the Rumble are pretty slim- and I can see Roman eliminating Bryan as another "message" to the IWC.
The Ascension v The Miz's
I don't know why, perhaps because the debut was in the penultimate segment so we had the full night to anticipate what would happen- but I was expecting so much more from The Ascensions debut than a throwaway squash match, but what would a WWE Main Roster Debut be if you couldn't bitch about it after?
John Cena in "The Negotiator 2"
So The Authority basically wanted Christmas Off and then they got Rollins to do what he could have done to pretty much every guest host- the laptop aside, and force Cenas hand. This was perhaps the most anti-climactic way to bring The Authority back, but bringing them back for Mania season hopefully means we'll see the final end to the angle at Mania- as I originally suggested and used as the reason as to why Team Cena wouldn't win at Survivor Series. This was the first time in a while they've properly had Cena come off as the Babyface the WWE want him to be, and they did it by putting him in a "Rock and Hard Place" situation- and Rollins came off as the perfect heel from this segment, and it was reinforced by his "You Don't Know me very well, I'll kill him anyway" line.
Overall this RAW finish aside was fresh, exciting and really rather good- especially when you contrast it to some of the RAWs we've had recently that have been completely awful.
Thanks as always for reading, this is my last RAW Review of 2014 so I'd just like to say thanks to everyone who's read and shared since I started this blog in August and I hope you'll continue doing so in 2015. So have a Happy New Year, and bare in mind we can go back to missing the first 20 Minutes of RAWs now!
Tuesday 30 December 2014
Fulham- A Look Back on 2014
Hello! Another blog, and not one I've been looking forward to doing in all honesty. Its been a very trying year for the club, 3 Managers, Cheese, Relegation, A Complete Squad overhaul and more. So brace yourselves to relive the last 12 Months and remember, 2015 can only be better (maybe).
January
Results
Fulham 2-1 West Ham
Norwich 1-1 Fulham (FA Cup)
Fulham 1-4 Sunderland
Fulham 3-0 Norwich (FA Cup)
Arsenal 2-0 Fulham
Sheff. Utd 1-1 Fulham (FA Cup)
Swansea 2-0 Fulham
January was an interesting month from a Fulham perspective, we went into the month with very mixed feelings we'd had good performances in December despite some of the scorelines suggesting otherwise and coming into January off the back of a 6-0 loss to Hull it couldn't get much worse. We started the month with a very scrappy 2-1 over a Ten-Man West Ham (who wanted Allardyce's head on a stick at this point) in what was at the time a vital relegation match and things seemed positive. A Draw away in the cup followed but then we put in an absolutely abject performance at home to Sunderland we should have probably been ahead through Berbatov but we ended up capitulating and when Jozy Altidore is looking dangerous against you, you should probably give up. We went on to comfortably beat Norwich in the Cup with a new Centre-Back pairing of Hangeland and Burn showing promise. Stekelenburg put in a good performance to no avail against a good Arsenal team, The Sheff. Utd game was a match against the pitch as much as anything else, but will live long in the memory because of "that" Darren Bent miss despite him being offside. The Swansea game was equally poor, but on that particular night attention was on other areas.
It broke in the build to the Swansea game that Kostas Mitroglou was on a flight to finalise terms with us, in what proved to be an eventful deadline day we ended up signing William Kvist, Kostas Mitroglou, Lewis Holtby, Larnell Cole, Ryan Tunnicliffe and Johnny Heitinga in a bid to avoid
relegation.
Debuts: Clint Dempsey (2nd), Ange-Freddy Plumain, Dan Burn, Lasse Vigen Christensen, Muamer Tankovic, Josh Passley, Chris David
February
Results
Fulham 0-3 Southampton
Fulham 0-1 Sheff. Utd
Man Utd 2-2 Fulham
Fulham 2-3 Liverpool
West Brom 1-1 Fulham
February was a month that pretty much summed up our entire season. We went down with a whimper to Southampton with no real threat, and then we went on to possibly the worst experience of a match I've ever had the misfortune of going to. It was freezing cold, the wind was almost gale force, the rain was belting down and it seemed the Fulham team on the pitch forgot how to play Football. I left before they scored because the tube strike was coming in and I had no desire to hang around for another 30 Minutes of Extra Time rather than going home, so that put an end to our Wembley dream for another season and as Rene Meulensteen put it we hit "Rock Bottom". We then went to Old Trafford with the addition of Juan Mata there was a new found optimism for David Moyes' Man Utd team what we put in on the Super Sunday was one of the most defensive performances I've seen in our history, despite the defensive line-up we still conceded two goals and us sitting on a One-Goal lead for as long as we did was an achievement in and of itself. But, we got the rub of the green that day and despite most of our players hardly being able to walk by the end of it we Bent scored the last minute equaliser that renewed our hopes of staying up. We then went on to play out another exciting tie against Liverpool, and if it weren't for Sascha Riethers clumsiness we would have probably gotten another 2-2 Draw.
However this wasn't enough for Shahid Khan and he implement our second managerial change of the season, and the first of the Calendar Year bringing in the Bundesliga winning manager Felix Magath- and not officially getting rid of Meulensteen, Wilkins and Co. until roughly a week after. Now, after the two performances that had immediately preceded the sacking some people were doubtful over the sacking, however it was pretty clear Rene was out of his depth and for the good performances against Man Utd and Liverpool there were both Sheffield United games to counter those on top of Hull and more, as such I was willing to give the new manager who came in with a vicious reputation a chance to turn things around and with the "new manager" effect I thought at the very least Magath would be our "Di Canio" and use his zany antics to keep the club in the League before quickly being dispatched, and we were on for the perfect start against West Brom. An Ashkan Dejagah goal looked like it was going to secure the points for us, combined with Stekelenburg making a number of good saves- but it wasn't to be and a Vydra goal somehow trickled into the net meaning we dropped more points against a relegation rival.
Debuts: William Kvist, Lewis Holtby, Johnny Heitinga, Ryan Tunnicliffe, Larnell Cole, Kostas Mitroglou
March
Results
Fulham 1-3 Chelsea
Cardiff 3-1 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Newcastle
Man City 5-0 Fulham
Fulham 1-3 Everton
In a month with 1 win, and a humiliating loss to a Relegation Rival it wasn't much for us as fans to sink our teeth into. We were done by an Andre Schurrle Hat-Trick and Chelseas general quality, which was fair game in my book we shouldn't have been prioritising Chelsea as a game to pick up points for Survival. The game following the Chelsea game however, the Cardiff game was the first time we saw Felix Magath's special brand of genius. His brainchild of playing Riise in front of Richardson down the Left, and giving Kostas Mitroglou- who clearly wasn't fit his first start was bad enough, giving Cauley Woodrow a Striker who had been at Southend not so long ago his debut in a vital relegation match was almost suicide, and we paid the price. A win against a Pardew-less Newcastle team via an Ashkan Dejagah winner, a recurring theme once again renewed hopes of a somewhat revival, and it was at this stage you were starting to wonder if Great Escape Part 2 was on. A thrashing away to Man City was almost expected, as with the Chelsea game it wasn't where we were going to pick up points. A good performance to close out the month against Everton didn't produce any points but definitely provided enough of a performance to maintain some hope of staying up.
Debuts: Cauley Woodrow, Patrick Roberts
April
Results
Aston Villa 1-2 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Norwich
Spurs 3-1 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Hull
With 2 Wins, 1 Draw and 1 Defeat to a Top 4 Chasing team this was a month where if it had come a month earlier it would have been much more welcome, the manner in which the Draw came about is another reason why this month will leave a sour taste in our mouths. We started the month away to Aston Villa backed by a sublime away support, and with Richardson and Holt trading goals in the second half and a ridiculously close goal-line technology decision denying Holtby in came Hugo Rodallega, this is a while ago so forgive my memory if I'm wrong- but in his first appearance since being subbed off crying against Sheff. Utd he rose highest to head home the winner and spark new life into our survival campaign. He followed suit the next week against Norwich to give us a 1-0 win and our first back to back wins of the Calendar Year and it now looked a real possibility that we could stay up. A 3-1 loss to Spurs wasn't ideal, but once again we put in enough of a performance to keep hopes high and between a missed penalty and two or three top draw Lloris saves it wasn't our day.
Now onto another Felix Magath brainchild, following the Spurs game we were 2 Points behind Norwich so a win would was required in our penultimate home game to Hull who's minds were fixed on Wembley. We started with 2 (at a push 3) offensive players for a must win game, subs were the only way to rectify it, and when we did go two goals up through Dejagah and Amorebieta- we then couldn't make a defensive sub to see the game through and between defensive howlers and general bad decisions it wasn't to be and our last real chance of getting into the driving seat with regard to survival was lost.
Debuts: Mahamadou Diarra (2nd),
May
Results
Stoke 4-1 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Crystal Palace
Magath's genius was then confirmed the next week, subbing off Holtby after roughly 30 minutes and starting Dan Burn at Right-Back in possibly the stupidest tactical selection I've ever seen, and that was that and we were down. A 2-2 Draw with two of our youth products Chris David and Cauley Woodrow boded well for the "New Dawn" of Fulham with a core of youth players but it was too late for the Premier League and we bid farewell after our long stay in the Top Division.
Following relegation we proceeded to release a lot of our players that were surplus to requirements with the full list of players being:
Neil Etheridge, Matthew Briggs, Johnny Heitinga, John Arne Riise, Damien Duff, Steve Sidwell, Giorgos Karagounis, Mahamadou Diarra, Derek Boateng and quite a few youth players. Out of the whole list the only ones I would have been keen to hang onto were Heitinga, Sidwell and Karagounis but in the case of Heitinga and Sidwell they were too good for the Championship and Karagounis had his eyes on retirement.
June
We started the month by releasing Brede Hangeland, and in turn the last member of our Europa League Final team was gone. With Tankovic going to AZ Alkmaar on a free and Riether going to Freiburg as our only outgoings of the month with the World Cup going on it wasn't a very eventful month.
With the signings slowly filtering in as well with Shaun Hutchinson, and then Adam Taggart coming in off the back of playing in the World Cup against Spain and Tim Hoogland coming in a day later the signings were slowly starting to filter in and it looked as though our new team was starting to take shape.
July
Results
East Fife 0-3 Fulham
Rangers 4-2 Fulham
Motherwell 0-2 Fulham
Crawley 0-2 Fulham
D.C. United 0-3 Fulham
We came into July with a Pre-Season tour of Scotland opening everything, opening with a comfortable win over East Fife with the Montenegrin Messi Elsad Zverotic scoring. We went on to lose to Rangers in a Behind-closed-Doors friendly where the team we fielded wasn't the best and went on to beat Motherwell 2-0 to close the tour with Ross McCormack captaining the team in that game. We then returned to England where goals for Stafylidis and Rodallega saw off Crawley relatively comfortably and we then headed to Jacksonville where among the unveiling of giant scoreboards and a Carrie Underwood concert there was in fact a football game where a Moussa Dembele Hat-Trick was the difference against a weakened D.C team.
On the transfers front we saw 4 players leave who would have been key to the team if I'd have had my way; Pajtim Kasami, Kieran Richardson, David Stockdale and Ashkan Dejagah. We got a decent fee for Kasami and with the money Dejagah was offered those two were fair game- with Richardsons injury problems it was perhaps best we got his Premier League wages off our books but when we sold Stockdale to at the time a Promotion Rival for a minimal amount it was suicide.
On the incomings front we had a busy month as well, with Kay Voser coming in from Basel before the biggest signing of ours- and the whole of the Championships summer went through roughly a week later, Ross McCormack. We then went on to sign Kostas Stafylidis on Loan before signing Thomas Eisfeld from Arsenal and Adil Chihi from Cologne on the same day later in the month.
August
Results
Caykur Rizespor 0-1 Fulham (Pre-Season)
Ipswich 2-1 Fulham
Fulham 0-1 Millwall
Fulham 0-1 Wolves
Derby 5-1 Fulham
Brentford 0-1 Fulham (Carling Cup)
Fulham 1-1 Cardiff
We began the month with our last Pre-Season friendly in Austria with Felix Magath in a Jaguars shirt it wasn't the best game with Jesse Joronen saving a Penalty before Cauley Woodrow scored a late goal to secure the win.
We kicked off our return to the Championship in the Late Kick-Off on TV in Ipswich, and it was a largely disappointing performance. Shaun Hutchinson was at fault for both goals in my opinion and despite a late surge sparked by the introduction of Woodrow and Roberts the late Tim Hoogland goal wasn't enough to get anything on our first game back. We then returned to the Cottage to face Millwall in another frustrating game where we did everything except score and our defensive frailties left Martyn Woolford free in the box to score an early winner. We then had another of Felix Magath's genius moments against Wolves where we started with Pat Roberts and Mark Fotheringham among others and we were completely bullied out of the game and didn't deserve anything. We then went to Derby where it became clear Magath's days were numbered, we were completely destroyed and the manner in which we simply gave up for their 5th goal spoke volumes for where the team were at. We did however pick up a point at Home to Cardiff with a first-half Tim Hoogland header not being enough for our first win, and this is also where it should have become apparent to Cardiff fans that Solskjaer was leading them down the garden path as well, this combined with us picking up our first win of the season away to Brentford in the Cup had given us some hope of somewhat of a comeback after the bad start.
On the transfers front it was a very mixed month with Stekelenburg and Mitroglou leaving on Loan to Monaco and Olympiakos respectively as our only outgoings during the month of August we then added a number of players to our ranks with Nikolay Bodurov, Mark Fotheringham, Dino Fazlic, Tiago Casasola and Gabor Kiraly all coming in for us.
Debuts: Jesse Joronen, Tim Hoogland, Kostas Stafylidis, Cameron Burgess, Nikolay Bodurov, Shaun Hutchinson, Ross McCormack, Emerson Hyndman, Thomas Eisfeld, George Williams, Sean Kavanagh, Mark Fotheringham, Ryan Williams, Kay Voser, Marcus Bettinelli, Adil Chihi
September
Results
Reading 3-0 Fulham
Nott. Forest 5-3 Fulham
Fulham 0-1 Blackburn
Fulham 2-1 Doncaster (Carling Cup)
Birmingham 1-2 Fulham
We started the month of September in an International Break with Deadline Day around the corner, and we had a busy (at least in comparison to the prior one) Summer Deadline Day for once. We were linked with a number of people- namely Mark Hudson, Jermaine Beckford and our only signing of the Day Matt Smith eventually being confirmed. With Alex Kacaniklic and Ryan Tunnicliffe going out on Loan as our only movement on the outgoings front.
Our first game of the month was also one of our worst, we were swept aside by a Reading team who aren't an amazing prospect this season, that combined with a good performance away to Forest but a ridiculously leaky defence proved to be the end of Felix Magath and Kit Symons was put in temporary charge.
Kit's first game ended in defeat at home to Blackburn, however the performance was completely different and being down to 10 Men for the length the team were and still looking like the better team for large parts of the game against a very good Blackburn team was a good sign. We then confirmed our place in the next round of the Carling Cup where we (eventually) saw the game off with the help of a Marcus Bettinelli Penalty Save- then finally picked up our first league win of the season away to Birmingham where goals from Hoogland and Rodallega finally gave us our first win at the end of September.
Debuts: Gabor Kiraly, Matt Smith
October
Results
Fulham 4-0 Bolton
Middlesborough 2-0 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Norwich
Rotherham 3-3 Fulham
Fulham 3-0 Charlton
Fulham 2-5 Derby (Carling Cup)
We started the month of October with a near perfect win against an albeit very poor Bolton side meaning we'd won two in a row (in the league) for the first time of the season and just before another International Break we travelled to a very difficult Middlesborough where we could have picked up a point on a different day- everything was boding well for the future. Coming from the back of the International Break we hosted top of the table Norwich, and in what would prove to be our best defensive display in a long time a Sean Kavanagh goal won us the game. We then went to Rotherham where we came back from behind three different times, the last being a Dan Burn header late on. We then hosted Charlton in our first Friday night game of the season and two early goals, combined with a Rodallega goal late on meant we beat a Charlton side who were just outside the Playoff places at the time to climb out of the Relegation Zone for the first time after we'd dropped into it, however we ended the month being on the end of a humbling defeat at home to Derby ending our Capital One Cup hopes for another season. We did however close out the month on a positive with the announcement of Kit Symons as Permanent Manager.
Debuts: Stephen Arthurworrey
November
Results
Wigan 3-3 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Blackpool
Fulham 3-1 Huddersfield
Brentford 2-1 Fulham
Brighton 1-2 Fulham
We kicked off the month under Kits full time leadership with a trip to Wigan and two Bryan Ruiz goals meant that a Ross McCormack Red Card didn't really matter and we took another point away from home. We then returned to the Cottage for what everyone assumed would be a straight-forward win against Blackpool which turned out to be anything but, and we ended up scraping a point from the game- and if it weren't for the Tony McMahon Red we probably wouldn't have got that, however just before we broke for the next International Break we had enough time to eventually dispatch a trick Huddersfield team aided by great performances from Ross McCormack and Lasse Vigen Christensen. Coming out of the International Break we headed to Griffin Park for our second derby of the season, and despite Marcus Bettinellis best efforts a last minute deflected goal from Jota meant we lost. To close out the month we went to the Amex and despite a Darren Bent opener goals from Rodallega and Christensen meant we ended the month on a high.
Debuts: Seko Fofana
December
Results
Fulham 0-5 Watford
Leeds 0-1 Fulham
Fulham 4-0 Sheff. Wednesday
Bournemouth 2-0 Fulham
Fulham 0-2 Brighton
We began the month in the worst way imaginable, between the thrashing we'd also had Bettinelli sent off meaning we had to have Gabor Kiraly in goal for the tough trip away to Leeds. However, contrary to what almost every Fulham fan imagined we actually kept a Clean Sheet in that game and won the game via a Hugo Rodallega winner (with Lasse Vigen Christensen helping out along the way)- we then returned to the Cottage and comfortably (eventually) beat Sheffield Wednesday 4-0 with the pick of the goals being a Ross McCormack Free-Kick and a great Counter-Attack launched and finished by Lasse Vigen Christensen which led us into Christmas on a high. However, the other side of Christmas brought us a hard trip away to top of the league Bournemouth and we were (eventually) dispatched 2-0 leading us to our last home game of the calendar year playing Relegation Threatened Brighton, but it wasn't to be and we put in an awful display to end the year and we were comfortably beaten 2-0 without ever properly threatening David Stockdale on a consistent basis.
Thanks for reading this longer blog, It might have been me expunging most of the bad memories from my brain- but while I was writing this I couldn't help but remember just how bad we were at various points of the year. Anyway, thanks again for reading and lets pray for a better 2015.
January
Results
Fulham 2-1 West Ham
Norwich 1-1 Fulham (FA Cup)
Fulham 1-4 Sunderland
Fulham 3-0 Norwich (FA Cup)
Arsenal 2-0 Fulham
Sheff. Utd 1-1 Fulham (FA Cup)
Swansea 2-0 Fulham
January was an interesting month from a Fulham perspective, we went into the month with very mixed feelings we'd had good performances in December despite some of the scorelines suggesting otherwise and coming into January off the back of a 6-0 loss to Hull it couldn't get much worse. We started the month with a very scrappy 2-1 over a Ten-Man West Ham (who wanted Allardyce's head on a stick at this point) in what was at the time a vital relegation match and things seemed positive. A Draw away in the cup followed but then we put in an absolutely abject performance at home to Sunderland we should have probably been ahead through Berbatov but we ended up capitulating and when Jozy Altidore is looking dangerous against you, you should probably give up. We went on to comfortably beat Norwich in the Cup with a new Centre-Back pairing of Hangeland and Burn showing promise. Stekelenburg put in a good performance to no avail against a good Arsenal team, The Sheff. Utd game was a match against the pitch as much as anything else, but will live long in the memory because of "that" Darren Bent miss despite him being offside. The Swansea game was equally poor, but on that particular night attention was on other areas.
It broke in the build to the Swansea game that Kostas Mitroglou was on a flight to finalise terms with us, in what proved to be an eventful deadline day we ended up signing William Kvist, Kostas Mitroglou, Lewis Holtby, Larnell Cole, Ryan Tunnicliffe and Johnny Heitinga in a bid to avoid
relegation.
Debuts: Clint Dempsey (2nd), Ange-Freddy Plumain, Dan Burn, Lasse Vigen Christensen, Muamer Tankovic, Josh Passley, Chris David
February
Results
Fulham 0-3 Southampton
Fulham 0-1 Sheff. Utd
Man Utd 2-2 Fulham
Fulham 2-3 Liverpool
West Brom 1-1 Fulham
February was a month that pretty much summed up our entire season. We went down with a whimper to Southampton with no real threat, and then we went on to possibly the worst experience of a match I've ever had the misfortune of going to. It was freezing cold, the wind was almost gale force, the rain was belting down and it seemed the Fulham team on the pitch forgot how to play Football. I left before they scored because the tube strike was coming in and I had no desire to hang around for another 30 Minutes of Extra Time rather than going home, so that put an end to our Wembley dream for another season and as Rene Meulensteen put it we hit "Rock Bottom". We then went to Old Trafford with the addition of Juan Mata there was a new found optimism for David Moyes' Man Utd team what we put in on the Super Sunday was one of the most defensive performances I've seen in our history, despite the defensive line-up we still conceded two goals and us sitting on a One-Goal lead for as long as we did was an achievement in and of itself. But, we got the rub of the green that day and despite most of our players hardly being able to walk by the end of it we Bent scored the last minute equaliser that renewed our hopes of staying up. We then went on to play out another exciting tie against Liverpool, and if it weren't for Sascha Riethers clumsiness we would have probably gotten another 2-2 Draw.
However this wasn't enough for Shahid Khan and he implement our second managerial change of the season, and the first of the Calendar Year bringing in the Bundesliga winning manager Felix Magath- and not officially getting rid of Meulensteen, Wilkins and Co. until roughly a week after. Now, after the two performances that had immediately preceded the sacking some people were doubtful over the sacking, however it was pretty clear Rene was out of his depth and for the good performances against Man Utd and Liverpool there were both Sheffield United games to counter those on top of Hull and more, as such I was willing to give the new manager who came in with a vicious reputation a chance to turn things around and with the "new manager" effect I thought at the very least Magath would be our "Di Canio" and use his zany antics to keep the club in the League before quickly being dispatched, and we were on for the perfect start against West Brom. An Ashkan Dejagah goal looked like it was going to secure the points for us, combined with Stekelenburg making a number of good saves- but it wasn't to be and a Vydra goal somehow trickled into the net meaning we dropped more points against a relegation rival.
Debuts: William Kvist, Lewis Holtby, Johnny Heitinga, Ryan Tunnicliffe, Larnell Cole, Kostas Mitroglou
March
Results
Fulham 1-3 Chelsea
Cardiff 3-1 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Newcastle
Man City 5-0 Fulham
Fulham 1-3 Everton
In a month with 1 win, and a humiliating loss to a Relegation Rival it wasn't much for us as fans to sink our teeth into. We were done by an Andre Schurrle Hat-Trick and Chelseas general quality, which was fair game in my book we shouldn't have been prioritising Chelsea as a game to pick up points for Survival. The game following the Chelsea game however, the Cardiff game was the first time we saw Felix Magath's special brand of genius. His brainchild of playing Riise in front of Richardson down the Left, and giving Kostas Mitroglou- who clearly wasn't fit his first start was bad enough, giving Cauley Woodrow a Striker who had been at Southend not so long ago his debut in a vital relegation match was almost suicide, and we paid the price. A win against a Pardew-less Newcastle team via an Ashkan Dejagah winner, a recurring theme once again renewed hopes of a somewhat revival, and it was at this stage you were starting to wonder if Great Escape Part 2 was on. A thrashing away to Man City was almost expected, as with the Chelsea game it wasn't where we were going to pick up points. A good performance to close out the month against Everton didn't produce any points but definitely provided enough of a performance to maintain some hope of staying up.
Debuts: Cauley Woodrow, Patrick Roberts
April
Results
Aston Villa 1-2 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Norwich
Spurs 3-1 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Hull
With 2 Wins, 1 Draw and 1 Defeat to a Top 4 Chasing team this was a month where if it had come a month earlier it would have been much more welcome, the manner in which the Draw came about is another reason why this month will leave a sour taste in our mouths. We started the month away to Aston Villa backed by a sublime away support, and with Richardson and Holt trading goals in the second half and a ridiculously close goal-line technology decision denying Holtby in came Hugo Rodallega, this is a while ago so forgive my memory if I'm wrong- but in his first appearance since being subbed off crying against Sheff. Utd he rose highest to head home the winner and spark new life into our survival campaign. He followed suit the next week against Norwich to give us a 1-0 win and our first back to back wins of the Calendar Year and it now looked a real possibility that we could stay up. A 3-1 loss to Spurs wasn't ideal, but once again we put in enough of a performance to keep hopes high and between a missed penalty and two or three top draw Lloris saves it wasn't our day.
Now onto another Felix Magath brainchild, following the Spurs game we were 2 Points behind Norwich so a win would was required in our penultimate home game to Hull who's minds were fixed on Wembley. We started with 2 (at a push 3) offensive players for a must win game, subs were the only way to rectify it, and when we did go two goals up through Dejagah and Amorebieta- we then couldn't make a defensive sub to see the game through and between defensive howlers and general bad decisions it wasn't to be and our last real chance of getting into the driving seat with regard to survival was lost.
Debuts: Mahamadou Diarra (2nd),
May
Results
Stoke 4-1 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Crystal Palace
Magath's genius was then confirmed the next week, subbing off Holtby after roughly 30 minutes and starting Dan Burn at Right-Back in possibly the stupidest tactical selection I've ever seen, and that was that and we were down. A 2-2 Draw with two of our youth products Chris David and Cauley Woodrow boded well for the "New Dawn" of Fulham with a core of youth players but it was too late for the Premier League and we bid farewell after our long stay in the Top Division.
Following relegation we proceeded to release a lot of our players that were surplus to requirements with the full list of players being:
Neil Etheridge, Matthew Briggs, Johnny Heitinga, John Arne Riise, Damien Duff, Steve Sidwell, Giorgos Karagounis, Mahamadou Diarra, Derek Boateng and quite a few youth players. Out of the whole list the only ones I would have been keen to hang onto were Heitinga, Sidwell and Karagounis but in the case of Heitinga and Sidwell they were too good for the Championship and Karagounis had his eyes on retirement.
June
We started the month by releasing Brede Hangeland, and in turn the last member of our Europa League Final team was gone. With Tankovic going to AZ Alkmaar on a free and Riether going to Freiburg as our only outgoings of the month with the World Cup going on it wasn't a very eventful month.
With the signings slowly filtering in as well with Shaun Hutchinson, and then Adam Taggart coming in off the back of playing in the World Cup against Spain and Tim Hoogland coming in a day later the signings were slowly starting to filter in and it looked as though our new team was starting to take shape.
July
Results
East Fife 0-3 Fulham
Rangers 4-2 Fulham
Motherwell 0-2 Fulham
Crawley 0-2 Fulham
D.C. United 0-3 Fulham
We came into July with a Pre-Season tour of Scotland opening everything, opening with a comfortable win over East Fife with the Montenegrin Messi Elsad Zverotic scoring. We went on to lose to Rangers in a Behind-closed-Doors friendly where the team we fielded wasn't the best and went on to beat Motherwell 2-0 to close the tour with Ross McCormack captaining the team in that game. We then returned to England where goals for Stafylidis and Rodallega saw off Crawley relatively comfortably and we then headed to Jacksonville where among the unveiling of giant scoreboards and a Carrie Underwood concert there was in fact a football game where a Moussa Dembele Hat-Trick was the difference against a weakened D.C team.
On the transfers front we saw 4 players leave who would have been key to the team if I'd have had my way; Pajtim Kasami, Kieran Richardson, David Stockdale and Ashkan Dejagah. We got a decent fee for Kasami and with the money Dejagah was offered those two were fair game- with Richardsons injury problems it was perhaps best we got his Premier League wages off our books but when we sold Stockdale to at the time a Promotion Rival for a minimal amount it was suicide.
On the incomings front we had a busy month as well, with Kay Voser coming in from Basel before the biggest signing of ours- and the whole of the Championships summer went through roughly a week later, Ross McCormack. We then went on to sign Kostas Stafylidis on Loan before signing Thomas Eisfeld from Arsenal and Adil Chihi from Cologne on the same day later in the month.
August
Results
Caykur Rizespor 0-1 Fulham (Pre-Season)
Ipswich 2-1 Fulham
Fulham 0-1 Millwall
Fulham 0-1 Wolves
Derby 5-1 Fulham
Brentford 0-1 Fulham (Carling Cup)
Fulham 1-1 Cardiff
We began the month with our last Pre-Season friendly in Austria with Felix Magath in a Jaguars shirt it wasn't the best game with Jesse Joronen saving a Penalty before Cauley Woodrow scored a late goal to secure the win.
We kicked off our return to the Championship in the Late Kick-Off on TV in Ipswich, and it was a largely disappointing performance. Shaun Hutchinson was at fault for both goals in my opinion and despite a late surge sparked by the introduction of Woodrow and Roberts the late Tim Hoogland goal wasn't enough to get anything on our first game back. We then returned to the Cottage to face Millwall in another frustrating game where we did everything except score and our defensive frailties left Martyn Woolford free in the box to score an early winner. We then had another of Felix Magath's genius moments against Wolves where we started with Pat Roberts and Mark Fotheringham among others and we were completely bullied out of the game and didn't deserve anything. We then went to Derby where it became clear Magath's days were numbered, we were completely destroyed and the manner in which we simply gave up for their 5th goal spoke volumes for where the team were at. We did however pick up a point at Home to Cardiff with a first-half Tim Hoogland header not being enough for our first win, and this is also where it should have become apparent to Cardiff fans that Solskjaer was leading them down the garden path as well, this combined with us picking up our first win of the season away to Brentford in the Cup had given us some hope of somewhat of a comeback after the bad start.
On the transfers front it was a very mixed month with Stekelenburg and Mitroglou leaving on Loan to Monaco and Olympiakos respectively as our only outgoings during the month of August we then added a number of players to our ranks with Nikolay Bodurov, Mark Fotheringham, Dino Fazlic, Tiago Casasola and Gabor Kiraly all coming in for us.
Debuts: Jesse Joronen, Tim Hoogland, Kostas Stafylidis, Cameron Burgess, Nikolay Bodurov, Shaun Hutchinson, Ross McCormack, Emerson Hyndman, Thomas Eisfeld, George Williams, Sean Kavanagh, Mark Fotheringham, Ryan Williams, Kay Voser, Marcus Bettinelli, Adil Chihi
September
Results
Reading 3-0 Fulham
Nott. Forest 5-3 Fulham
Fulham 0-1 Blackburn
Fulham 2-1 Doncaster (Carling Cup)
Birmingham 1-2 Fulham
We started the month of September in an International Break with Deadline Day around the corner, and we had a busy (at least in comparison to the prior one) Summer Deadline Day for once. We were linked with a number of people- namely Mark Hudson, Jermaine Beckford and our only signing of the Day Matt Smith eventually being confirmed. With Alex Kacaniklic and Ryan Tunnicliffe going out on Loan as our only movement on the outgoings front.
Our first game of the month was also one of our worst, we were swept aside by a Reading team who aren't an amazing prospect this season, that combined with a good performance away to Forest but a ridiculously leaky defence proved to be the end of Felix Magath and Kit Symons was put in temporary charge.
Kit's first game ended in defeat at home to Blackburn, however the performance was completely different and being down to 10 Men for the length the team were and still looking like the better team for large parts of the game against a very good Blackburn team was a good sign. We then confirmed our place in the next round of the Carling Cup where we (eventually) saw the game off with the help of a Marcus Bettinelli Penalty Save- then finally picked up our first league win of the season away to Birmingham where goals from Hoogland and Rodallega finally gave us our first win at the end of September.
Debuts: Gabor Kiraly, Matt Smith
October
Results
Fulham 4-0 Bolton
Middlesborough 2-0 Fulham
Fulham 1-0 Norwich
Rotherham 3-3 Fulham
Fulham 3-0 Charlton
Fulham 2-5 Derby (Carling Cup)
We started the month of October with a near perfect win against an albeit very poor Bolton side meaning we'd won two in a row (in the league) for the first time of the season and just before another International Break we travelled to a very difficult Middlesborough where we could have picked up a point on a different day- everything was boding well for the future. Coming from the back of the International Break we hosted top of the table Norwich, and in what would prove to be our best defensive display in a long time a Sean Kavanagh goal won us the game. We then went to Rotherham where we came back from behind three different times, the last being a Dan Burn header late on. We then hosted Charlton in our first Friday night game of the season and two early goals, combined with a Rodallega goal late on meant we beat a Charlton side who were just outside the Playoff places at the time to climb out of the Relegation Zone for the first time after we'd dropped into it, however we ended the month being on the end of a humbling defeat at home to Derby ending our Capital One Cup hopes for another season. We did however close out the month on a positive with the announcement of Kit Symons as Permanent Manager.
Debuts: Stephen Arthurworrey
November
Results
Wigan 3-3 Fulham
Fulham 2-2 Blackpool
Fulham 3-1 Huddersfield
Brentford 2-1 Fulham
Brighton 1-2 Fulham
We kicked off the month under Kits full time leadership with a trip to Wigan and two Bryan Ruiz goals meant that a Ross McCormack Red Card didn't really matter and we took another point away from home. We then returned to the Cottage for what everyone assumed would be a straight-forward win against Blackpool which turned out to be anything but, and we ended up scraping a point from the game- and if it weren't for the Tony McMahon Red we probably wouldn't have got that, however just before we broke for the next International Break we had enough time to eventually dispatch a trick Huddersfield team aided by great performances from Ross McCormack and Lasse Vigen Christensen. Coming out of the International Break we headed to Griffin Park for our second derby of the season, and despite Marcus Bettinellis best efforts a last minute deflected goal from Jota meant we lost. To close out the month we went to the Amex and despite a Darren Bent opener goals from Rodallega and Christensen meant we ended the month on a high.
Debuts: Seko Fofana
December
Results
Fulham 0-5 Watford
Leeds 0-1 Fulham
Fulham 4-0 Sheff. Wednesday
Bournemouth 2-0 Fulham
Fulham 0-2 Brighton
We began the month in the worst way imaginable, between the thrashing we'd also had Bettinelli sent off meaning we had to have Gabor Kiraly in goal for the tough trip away to Leeds. However, contrary to what almost every Fulham fan imagined we actually kept a Clean Sheet in that game and won the game via a Hugo Rodallega winner (with Lasse Vigen Christensen helping out along the way)- we then returned to the Cottage and comfortably (eventually) beat Sheffield Wednesday 4-0 with the pick of the goals being a Ross McCormack Free-Kick and a great Counter-Attack launched and finished by Lasse Vigen Christensen which led us into Christmas on a high. However, the other side of Christmas brought us a hard trip away to top of the league Bournemouth and we were (eventually) dispatched 2-0 leading us to our last home game of the calendar year playing Relegation Threatened Brighton, but it wasn't to be and we put in an awful display to end the year and we were comfortably beaten 2-0 without ever properly threatening David Stockdale on a consistent basis.
Thanks for reading this longer blog, It might have been me expunging most of the bad memories from my brain- but while I was writing this I couldn't help but remember just how bad we were at various points of the year. Anyway, thanks again for reading and lets pray for a better 2015.
Monday 29 December 2014
Fulham v Brighton Review: Abject
Hey there! I've found there is generally more to talk about when we've played badly- so prepare to read a book. There are some games you simply wish you hadn't gone to, and this was one of them- there wasn't any tubes to Putney Bridge so that added about another 30 minutes onto the journey to the game, the weather was cold- although I didn't get cold for some weird reason. Then we get onto the performance, or rather lack of one.
The two goals pretty much summed up our overall performance. From where I sit I don't always have the greatest depth perception, but I don't think Stafylidis needed to dive in when he gave away the penalty and thats the second Penalty Stafylidis has given away (off the top of my head, it could be more). I'll admit I didn't really see the second goal, as far as I can work out it was a simple through ball to Solly March and he slotted it home- easy right?
In some games Bettinelli has conceded, but also been our best player by a mile because of the number of saves he's made. However, in this one- yes he made some saves but most of them were quite routine as such its hard to judge his performance because he was never really tested like he has been in previous games. Contrast this to Stockdale who must have thought his luck was in when it came to around the 65-70 Minute mark when he'd barely had to lift a finger, the only two times we tested Stockdale in the whole match were from Kavanagh's curler and then a shot on goal from someone I can't remember- but it also produced a good save.
I'm honestly not sure what to say with regard to our defensive performance today. Despite them scoring two goals Brighton were pretty toothless today, if we'd left them to their own devices (i.e. not giving them the penalty) we would have probably kept a Clean Sheet as the reason they got in behind our defence for the second goal was because we were chasing the game, similar to the Bournemouth game. Bodurov must have set some kind of record with regard to touches and/or passes in a single game tonight, the number of times we passed the ball backwards to Bodurov (and Hutchinson) was ridiculous. I thought Grimmer played pretty well today, he looked a lot more comfortable on the ball in comparison to some other matches and he got forward well- however both Grimmer and Stafylidis can't cross for anything, and that is one area where Amorebieta absolutely destroys Stafylidis with regard to aspects of their games. As I've already said, and at the risk of rambling- Despite conceding two goals the defence as a singular entity weren't inherently bad and there are definitely more pressing issues that have come out of tonights game.
The midfield was absolutely appalling tonight. firstly, I think this match proved- similar to the Blackpool game with regard to McCormack that we simply can't function without Lasse Vigen Christensen- and to a lesser extent Ruiz. The midfield tonight was completely devoid of- well pretty much everything. I'm not sure if I should include McCormack in this paragraph considering he was playing in the gap between the Midfield and the Defence for quite a lot of the game, but considering Hugo did nothing and I need material I won't. Firstly, Whoever thought Fofana was a Right-Mid was a good idea should be shot. Fofana is what I'd call a "powerful runner"- but in no way is he a winger, and we looked ridiculously lopsided as a result. Hyndman was pretty ineffective tonight, he just didn't look like doing much is pretty much the only thing you can say with regard to his performance today- and this is a similar story to Parkers performance; although he was marginally better, or at least in my opinion he was. George Williams frustrated me today, yes he can run- and occasionally beat players; but what else can he do? His defensive work is average at best, and in a game where we were lacking imagination he was figuratively (and most likely literally) frozen out of the game.
In my preview I said with regard to Hugo that strikers shouldn't always be judged on goals, well after this game you definitely can't judge McCormack as a striker full stop. There is a difference between "drifting" and being hopelessly out of position- and for the majority of the game today he was hopelessly out of position. The problem is, there is no way in hell McCormack would have played that role unless he was told to- I'm guessing he was told to do so to compensate for the lack of Christensen (and Ruiz) but that just led to two things, Hugo being stranded (again) and McCormack not being able to pose a proper attacking threat and have a sight at goal. As I've just said, Hugo was completely stranded again today. It must be beyond frustrating for Hugo to play in a team as he did tonight that are completely devoid of ideas and any form of creativity- and hopefully when we go back to the League in just under two weeks we'll have bucked up our ideas and have that "spark" that we had when Kit first took over.
Once again Kits subs weren't up to par; Yes we didn't have many options to choose from- which is ludicrous when you consider the size of our squad, but equally the subs Kit did make made little to impact on the game and once again he made them too late in my opinion. It seemed that it took conceding to make Kit do something, because we were poor long before the Penalty and we didn't make any changes- and that isn't the right way to think when you're struggling at home to a team who were (at the time) in the Relegation Zone. The Kavanagh sub was a strange one when it happened, but he did provide a better Left-Boot and at least looked mildly threatening coming in off the wing, and he probably had our best shot of the game- but he also came on presumably to take set pieces because McCormacks deadball delivery was awful tonight, another reason why Bryan is important (see our 2nd against Sheff. Wednesday) but his delivery was equally as poor and I think he only managed to clear the first man twice from Corners. Once again, we brought on Woodrow and Roberts too late to make a proper impact. I agree to an extent with regard to Roberts not necessarily deserving a spot in the team- but when the alternative is an exhausted Fofana on the Right its a No-Brainer surely, and I'm wondering if there is some clause in Fofanas Loan Deal where he has to play "X" Number of Minutes.
Overall this game was probably the worst way to end the year, which has been a trying one at that- and one that'll be summed up in my "Look back at 2014" Blog that'll be up soon. However there are some positives to take in my opinion; as I said in my Bournemouth review I'm never happy to lose, but these last two games has almost ensured that Khan will spend in January- where he may have thought we could have held over until the summer had we been playing well and winning games consistently, because despite our squad size it simply isn't good enough to be proper Playoff Contenders.
Thanks as always for reading, I'm pretty much going to have a Fulham blog everyday until after the Wolves game so check in regularly if you want to keep up to date- and lets not let this performance wreck our New Year Celebrations.
The two goals pretty much summed up our overall performance. From where I sit I don't always have the greatest depth perception, but I don't think Stafylidis needed to dive in when he gave away the penalty and thats the second Penalty Stafylidis has given away (off the top of my head, it could be more). I'll admit I didn't really see the second goal, as far as I can work out it was a simple through ball to Solly March and he slotted it home- easy right?
In some games Bettinelli has conceded, but also been our best player by a mile because of the number of saves he's made. However, in this one- yes he made some saves but most of them were quite routine as such its hard to judge his performance because he was never really tested like he has been in previous games. Contrast this to Stockdale who must have thought his luck was in when it came to around the 65-70 Minute mark when he'd barely had to lift a finger, the only two times we tested Stockdale in the whole match were from Kavanagh's curler and then a shot on goal from someone I can't remember- but it also produced a good save.
I'm honestly not sure what to say with regard to our defensive performance today. Despite them scoring two goals Brighton were pretty toothless today, if we'd left them to their own devices (i.e. not giving them the penalty) we would have probably kept a Clean Sheet as the reason they got in behind our defence for the second goal was because we were chasing the game, similar to the Bournemouth game. Bodurov must have set some kind of record with regard to touches and/or passes in a single game tonight, the number of times we passed the ball backwards to Bodurov (and Hutchinson) was ridiculous. I thought Grimmer played pretty well today, he looked a lot more comfortable on the ball in comparison to some other matches and he got forward well- however both Grimmer and Stafylidis can't cross for anything, and that is one area where Amorebieta absolutely destroys Stafylidis with regard to aspects of their games. As I've already said, and at the risk of rambling- Despite conceding two goals the defence as a singular entity weren't inherently bad and there are definitely more pressing issues that have come out of tonights game.
The midfield was absolutely appalling tonight. firstly, I think this match proved- similar to the Blackpool game with regard to McCormack that we simply can't function without Lasse Vigen Christensen- and to a lesser extent Ruiz. The midfield tonight was completely devoid of- well pretty much everything. I'm not sure if I should include McCormack in this paragraph considering he was playing in the gap between the Midfield and the Defence for quite a lot of the game, but considering Hugo did nothing and I need material I won't. Firstly, Whoever thought Fofana was a Right-Mid was a good idea should be shot. Fofana is what I'd call a "powerful runner"- but in no way is he a winger, and we looked ridiculously lopsided as a result. Hyndman was pretty ineffective tonight, he just didn't look like doing much is pretty much the only thing you can say with regard to his performance today- and this is a similar story to Parkers performance; although he was marginally better, or at least in my opinion he was. George Williams frustrated me today, yes he can run- and occasionally beat players; but what else can he do? His defensive work is average at best, and in a game where we were lacking imagination he was figuratively (and most likely literally) frozen out of the game.
In my preview I said with regard to Hugo that strikers shouldn't always be judged on goals, well after this game you definitely can't judge McCormack as a striker full stop. There is a difference between "drifting" and being hopelessly out of position- and for the majority of the game today he was hopelessly out of position. The problem is, there is no way in hell McCormack would have played that role unless he was told to- I'm guessing he was told to do so to compensate for the lack of Christensen (and Ruiz) but that just led to two things, Hugo being stranded (again) and McCormack not being able to pose a proper attacking threat and have a sight at goal. As I've just said, Hugo was completely stranded again today. It must be beyond frustrating for Hugo to play in a team as he did tonight that are completely devoid of ideas and any form of creativity- and hopefully when we go back to the League in just under two weeks we'll have bucked up our ideas and have that "spark" that we had when Kit first took over.
Once again Kits subs weren't up to par; Yes we didn't have many options to choose from- which is ludicrous when you consider the size of our squad, but equally the subs Kit did make made little to impact on the game and once again he made them too late in my opinion. It seemed that it took conceding to make Kit do something, because we were poor long before the Penalty and we didn't make any changes- and that isn't the right way to think when you're struggling at home to a team who were (at the time) in the Relegation Zone. The Kavanagh sub was a strange one when it happened, but he did provide a better Left-Boot and at least looked mildly threatening coming in off the wing, and he probably had our best shot of the game- but he also came on presumably to take set pieces because McCormacks deadball delivery was awful tonight, another reason why Bryan is important (see our 2nd against Sheff. Wednesday) but his delivery was equally as poor and I think he only managed to clear the first man twice from Corners. Once again, we brought on Woodrow and Roberts too late to make a proper impact. I agree to an extent with regard to Roberts not necessarily deserving a spot in the team- but when the alternative is an exhausted Fofana on the Right its a No-Brainer surely, and I'm wondering if there is some clause in Fofanas Loan Deal where he has to play "X" Number of Minutes.
Overall this game was probably the worst way to end the year, which has been a trying one at that- and one that'll be summed up in my "Look back at 2014" Blog that'll be up soon. However there are some positives to take in my opinion; as I said in my Bournemouth review I'm never happy to lose, but these last two games has almost ensured that Khan will spend in January- where he may have thought we could have held over until the summer had we been playing well and winning games consistently, because despite our squad size it simply isn't good enough to be proper Playoff Contenders.
Thanks as always for reading, I'm pretty much going to have a Fulham blog everyday until after the Wolves game so check in regularly if you want to keep up to date- and lets not let this performance wreck our New Year Celebrations.
Sunday 28 December 2014
Fulham v Brighton Preview: The Second Half
Hello! We're here with another Preview, and what will be my last Preview Blog of 2014 and we're coming up against a Brighton side who have seen a managerial change not so long ago with Sami Hyypia departing and unless something drastic happens they'll be coming into the game with Nathan Jones as Caretaker, however coming off the back of scoring 2 Goals in a 2 Goal comeback from Boxing Day this Brighton team is looking like a different, and more threatening proposition than they did just over a week ago.
We are of course welcoming some familiar faces back for the first time, with David Stockdale and Aaron Hughes likely to start tomorrow- and I'm sure they'll receive a very warm reception. Unfortunately or Fortunately depending on your point of view it looks as though Darren Bent will miss out on the game tomorrow, on the one hand I was looking forward to giving him a "special" reception tomorrow- but he was likely to score because of that very reason so it does work both ways.
Coming into the game we're the only Monday game, which again can work both ways with regard to knowing results and the permutations of those results. As a result of the results today we've dropped to 17th, however any kind of win would take us up to 14th and in a very unlikely event a 3 Goal Winning Margin would take us up into the Top Half of the Table (provisionally) for the New Year, and I'm sure we'd all agree after the first 8 Games that will be a good accomplishment and give us a good foundation for 2015. Speaking of foundations, we're now beginning the second half of the season, and a very important half at that- as I briefly touched on in my Bournemouth Review the factors surrounding our first 23 and the teams we had to play away- combined with giving all of the other teams in the League an 8 Games head-start effectively has meant I'm quietly confident with regard to the second half, but we need to start off the second half of the season by setting a precedent and winning our home games will be a must.
Now onto the game itself, After another great performance Bettinelli will continue in goal- and it'll be a very interesting game with regard to Goalkeepers as we'll see another direct comparison between Stockdale and Bettinelli as they both sit behind two relatively mediocre defences and are sure to be busy tomorrow- hopefully more so in Stockdales case.
As I've just said, we'll both be facing and fielding a pretty mediocre defence tomorrow- but the past three games have given me hope with regard to keeping a third clean sheet from our last 4 games. Aside from the defending for Bournemouths first goal I was reasonably happy with our defensive performance on Boxing Day- although Bournemouth created chances they were largely half chances and I thought we restricted them quite well given our defensive weakness and their potency in front of goal. Using Nathan Jones' only game in charge as a basis it looks as though Brighton will be playing a Traditional 4-3-3 tomorrow as such we'll have to deal with the width Brighton possess and can create with players like Bennett and Colunga. However, I thought Stafylidis copes reasonably well with Elliot Bennett a month ago so I don't see a reason to change things around- we were let off the hook somewhat a month ago with LuaLua going off injured relatively early and again using the game on Boxing Day as a basis it looks as though he isn't back yet as such I don't see any reason as to why we should change our formation as I did for Bournemouth- and in turn we should stick with the game defence.
The Midfield is an interesting proposition tomorrow. I'm not sure whether to work on the basis Christensen is injured after he was subbed on Boxing Day, and due to the congested nature of the fixtures Kit hasn't had a Pre-Match conference to tell us one way or the other. As such I'm going to talk about other options we have, but still have Christensen in my team with an "*" next to his name. With Christensen's status in doubt we of course need to look at other midfield options, the obvious name would be Hyndman who started in the reverse fixture a month ago- and he would provide a similar style to Christensen just not necessarily as well, however coming into a home game against a team who are in the Relegation Zone I think we should be a bit more offensive. I'd start George Williams and use his pace similar to the way he was used against Sheffield Wednesday when he came on, and in the absence of Christensen- Williams would be a good player to launch counter-attacks with. The other two midfield spots are pretty straightforward in my opinion I don't see a reason why Fofana and Parker would be dropped unless it was for tiredness- which would affect Parker more so, however I would hope Kit had this game in mind when naming the team for Bournemouth and would have acknowledged that having Parker in the team as often as possible was a must. Tomorrow is also likely to be the final chapter of the Bryan Ruiz-Fulham saga, unless Kit surprises me (and I'm sure others) I can't see Kit playing Bryan in January unless he has a commitment from Bryan that he is staying as it isn't worth the risk of Bryan getting injured when he should/could fetch us in excess of £4Million pretty easily. As I said, I don't see Bryan being rested for tomorrows game- because of his complete lack of exertion on Boxing Day- and hopefully he goes out on a high.
The Striker debate has definitely opened up again after Hugo had a baron game against Bournemouth, but in my opinion there is no debate. Yes, Hugo has now gone two games without a goal- but one of those games I thought he did really well in (Sheff. Wednesday) and the other he (and the rest of the team) were completely strangled by a very well organised Bournemouth team who restrict most teams. As such I'd persist with the Hugo-McCormack partnership for at least one more game before even reopening the debate with regard to alternative options- and as I've made reference to with regard to McCormack at various parts of the season strikers shouldn't always be judged on goals, and against a much worse defence (in comparison to Bournemouth) I would expect us to create enough chances to where Hugo/McCormack will either score- or have a chance where they should have scored.
Team for Brighton
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Fofana, Parker, G. Williams*
Ruiz
Rodallega McCormack
*Christensen
Thanks as always for reading- Its been a trying year for Fulham fans, and one I'll be summarising in my "2014 in Review blog" most likely coming out on Tuesday- so stay tuned for that. But, lets hope we end the year on a high and go into 2015 fresh off the back of a win.
We are of course welcoming some familiar faces back for the first time, with David Stockdale and Aaron Hughes likely to start tomorrow- and I'm sure they'll receive a very warm reception. Unfortunately or Fortunately depending on your point of view it looks as though Darren Bent will miss out on the game tomorrow, on the one hand I was looking forward to giving him a "special" reception tomorrow- but he was likely to score because of that very reason so it does work both ways.
Coming into the game we're the only Monday game, which again can work both ways with regard to knowing results and the permutations of those results. As a result of the results today we've dropped to 17th, however any kind of win would take us up to 14th and in a very unlikely event a 3 Goal Winning Margin would take us up into the Top Half of the Table (provisionally) for the New Year, and I'm sure we'd all agree after the first 8 Games that will be a good accomplishment and give us a good foundation for 2015. Speaking of foundations, we're now beginning the second half of the season, and a very important half at that- as I briefly touched on in my Bournemouth Review the factors surrounding our first 23 and the teams we had to play away- combined with giving all of the other teams in the League an 8 Games head-start effectively has meant I'm quietly confident with regard to the second half, but we need to start off the second half of the season by setting a precedent and winning our home games will be a must.
Now onto the game itself, After another great performance Bettinelli will continue in goal- and it'll be a very interesting game with regard to Goalkeepers as we'll see another direct comparison between Stockdale and Bettinelli as they both sit behind two relatively mediocre defences and are sure to be busy tomorrow- hopefully more so in Stockdales case.
As I've just said, we'll both be facing and fielding a pretty mediocre defence tomorrow- but the past three games have given me hope with regard to keeping a third clean sheet from our last 4 games. Aside from the defending for Bournemouths first goal I was reasonably happy with our defensive performance on Boxing Day- although Bournemouth created chances they were largely half chances and I thought we restricted them quite well given our defensive weakness and their potency in front of goal. Using Nathan Jones' only game in charge as a basis it looks as though Brighton will be playing a Traditional 4-3-3 tomorrow as such we'll have to deal with the width Brighton possess and can create with players like Bennett and Colunga. However, I thought Stafylidis copes reasonably well with Elliot Bennett a month ago so I don't see a reason to change things around- we were let off the hook somewhat a month ago with LuaLua going off injured relatively early and again using the game on Boxing Day as a basis it looks as though he isn't back yet as such I don't see any reason as to why we should change our formation as I did for Bournemouth- and in turn we should stick with the game defence.
The Midfield is an interesting proposition tomorrow. I'm not sure whether to work on the basis Christensen is injured after he was subbed on Boxing Day, and due to the congested nature of the fixtures Kit hasn't had a Pre-Match conference to tell us one way or the other. As such I'm going to talk about other options we have, but still have Christensen in my team with an "*" next to his name. With Christensen's status in doubt we of course need to look at other midfield options, the obvious name would be Hyndman who started in the reverse fixture a month ago- and he would provide a similar style to Christensen just not necessarily as well, however coming into a home game against a team who are in the Relegation Zone I think we should be a bit more offensive. I'd start George Williams and use his pace similar to the way he was used against Sheffield Wednesday when he came on, and in the absence of Christensen- Williams would be a good player to launch counter-attacks with. The other two midfield spots are pretty straightforward in my opinion I don't see a reason why Fofana and Parker would be dropped unless it was for tiredness- which would affect Parker more so, however I would hope Kit had this game in mind when naming the team for Bournemouth and would have acknowledged that having Parker in the team as often as possible was a must. Tomorrow is also likely to be the final chapter of the Bryan Ruiz-Fulham saga, unless Kit surprises me (and I'm sure others) I can't see Kit playing Bryan in January unless he has a commitment from Bryan that he is staying as it isn't worth the risk of Bryan getting injured when he should/could fetch us in excess of £4Million pretty easily. As I said, I don't see Bryan being rested for tomorrows game- because of his complete lack of exertion on Boxing Day- and hopefully he goes out on a high.
The Striker debate has definitely opened up again after Hugo had a baron game against Bournemouth, but in my opinion there is no debate. Yes, Hugo has now gone two games without a goal- but one of those games I thought he did really well in (Sheff. Wednesday) and the other he (and the rest of the team) were completely strangled by a very well organised Bournemouth team who restrict most teams. As such I'd persist with the Hugo-McCormack partnership for at least one more game before even reopening the debate with regard to alternative options- and as I've made reference to with regard to McCormack at various parts of the season strikers shouldn't always be judged on goals, and against a much worse defence (in comparison to Bournemouth) I would expect us to create enough chances to where Hugo/McCormack will either score- or have a chance where they should have scored.
Team for Brighton
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Fofana, Parker, G. Williams*
Ruiz
Rodallega McCormack
*Christensen
Thanks as always for reading- Its been a trying year for Fulham fans, and one I'll be summarising in my "2014 in Review blog" most likely coming out on Tuesday- so stay tuned for that. But, lets hope we end the year on a high and go into 2015 fresh off the back of a win.
Friday 26 December 2014
Bournemouth v Fulham Review: Perspective
Hello again, todays game wasn't the best unless I'm mistaken we didn't have a shot on target- but it really isn't all doom and gloom on a Fulham front after the game today. Firstly, we have to keep in mind we were playing top of the league- that sentence could seem patronising to some, but there are always a section of Fulham fans who latch onto a perceived "bad" performance and act like the world is going to end. As I said in my preview, this is the hardest game we could have gotten at possibly the worst time- away to top of the league is a game I'd have preferred in a run of Saturday-Saturday games so we could have prepared properly for it, without having another game in the back of our minds the whole time.
Considering our defensive- and Bournemouths offensive records we didn't disgrace ourselves by any means to "only" lose 2-0, and this was somewhat similar to the Middlesborough game where we could have kept it at 1-0 had we tried to settle as opposed to pushing forward for an equaliser. The first goal came from our old nemesis- set pieces, it seems as though no matter what defence we play- what manager we have we simply can't defend corners on a consistent basis and we were punished again today. The second goal came from Fofana losing the ball- and when I get onto the midfield I'm not sure why he was still on the pitch at this point and the Arter goal was a good one and not a goal anyone could really have done anything about considering we were pushing numbers forward in an attempt to get the equaliser.
Once again Bettinelli was great, unless I'm mistaken he's saved 2 of the 3 Penalties he's faced for us this season and on top of the Penalty Save he also made a number of saves that kept us in the game. Similar to the Brentford game even though he conceded two goals he was our Man of the Match from the game by a clear margin and didn't really deserve to be on the losing team.
The defensive performance wasn't amazing, but in comparison to some of the games we've had away from home we were infinitely better. Considering the team we were playing against, with the threat they posed from nearly everyone I thought we coped pretty well with them. We coped with the majority of crosses into the box well enough- and we largely reduced them to half chances and shots from outside the box. I thought Grimmer was the worst out of the defenders we had today, his performances seem to vary greatly- although the performance today could be put down to the opposition. The Hutchinson-Bodurov partnership is still looking like our best one at present, and going into the Brighton game where Bent will presumably be starting we might as well stick with the Centre-Back partnership that kept him quiet for the majority of the game a month ago. I thought Stafylidis looked pretty solid today, he was pretty wasteful when he was going forward in my opinion- but that isn't a new occurence. Considering Bournemouths scoring record, and I think when we conceded early on we were fearing another 5-0 drubbing- but all things considered I'm pretty satisfied with our defensive efforts for the game today.
The midfield was an interesting battle today, firstly I think Kit got his tactics wrong with regard to the midfield today. I think we should have gone for a traditional 4-4-2 with George Williams and Pat Roberts coming in for Fofana and Ruiz, and this would have allowed us to counter with a lot of pace and be pretty dangerous considering Daniels and Francis aren't the fastest full-backs in the world. As such we stuck with the same team we played against Sheffield Wednesday, which I fundamentally disagree with because we should have prioritised the Brighton game where (despite their result today) the points are for the taking and it will be interesting to see how we shape up for the game on Monday. Unless Christensen was injured- which I'm praying he wasn't, I don't see a logical reason why Kit took LVC off instead of Fofana or Ruiz considering he's been our most potent midfielder this season and out of the three is the most likely to make something happen in the type of game we found ourselves in today. As such we took him off, and (an injury notwithstanding) I hope that sub was made with an eye on Monday where LVC will hopefully run the show. As such we kept Fofana on for the whole game, and he was at fault (to an extent) for the 2nd goal- but in the scenario we were in by that point I don't mind conceding another if we were properly hunting for an equaliser as we were doing. Bryan was pretty ineffective today, as I predicted he would be; however I don't see a reason why he shouldn't be able to play on Monday given the energy- or lack thereof he expended in the game today. I'll talk about it more with the Striker section, but the midfield today were largely shut out of the game today- which you have to credit Bournemouth for but this isn't a game where we should make sweeping judgements over our midfield for that exact reason.
As I've just referred to McCormack and Hugo in particular were completely devoid of service in todays game. The way we've played- even under "him" we've always had a clear chance that we should have put away- and that didn't really come today there were a few half chances but there wasn't a moment where you went "he should have scored that". As I've said though, considering the way Bournemouth defended today this isn't the game to make a sweeping judgement from- I've seen some people calling for Hugo to be dropped and that is complete nonsense, just because he was completely starved today doesn't mean he should be dropped; in my opinion he played pretty well against Sheffield Wednesday contrary to what some people have said and those are the two games he hasn't scored in after he scored in 4 of our last 5. McCormack was on balance our most dangerous player today, he looked like would make things happen- which is a common theme with him, in the second half of the season and aside from a goal there wasn't really much more McCormack could have done.
The subs we made frustrated me, as I said I don't think Christensen should have come off unless he was injured- but we eventually were playing the team I suggested starting with, and we started really pressuring Bournemouth when we did have that team. There is going to be an inevitable debate as to whether George Williams dived, I haven't seen a clear angle- and even if there was a Football League Show tonight (which there isn't) I doubt we'll see it from a proper "TV" angle so we'll be left to wonder and blow up pictures from the standard side-on angle to try and spot a touch on him. Roberts and Woodrow weren't really on long enough to make an impact- and that is one area where Kit has to improve as Roberts and Woodrow do have the ability to change the dynamic of a game- but bringing them on when the Clock starts with an "8" isn't giving them much time to bed into the game and do so.
As the title suggests I'm not going overboard as a result of one loss, we do need to have some perspective- we were playing a team who's last loss in the League was September 30th, a team who score goals for fun usually a team who under "him" would have swept us aside most likely reaching double figures in doing so. I'm never "happy" to lose, but I like to think of myself as reasonably level-headed and I accept we can't win every game but what I'm happy with from the game is that we pushed top of the league to the absolute brink and we could have kept it at 1 if we so wished in my opinion.
We're now exactly half way through the season, as a result of the games today we're 15th- which going into the season many people would've seen as an abject failure. However, after the first 8 games to be where we are I'm reasonably happy. You also have to consider we've played 5 of the Top 6 Away from home already this season, while I'm not saying we are guaranteed to pick up points at home to Bournemouth, Derby, Ipswich, Brentford and Middlesborough we are definitely more likely to- and if we are serious about even getting close to the Top 6 we need to. That combined with the fact we won't be giving other teams an 8 games head-start for the back 23 means I'm still quite hopeful of being in and around the playoffs given the points tally we've accumulated in the 15 Games we've had under Kit. We've got one game left of this calendar year on Monday- and if we win and results go our way we'll be Top Half going into the New Year and that will give us a foundation to build on for 2015.
Finally, what in gods name were we wearing today- I think White-Orange-White has to go down as one of our more bizarre combinations.
Thanks for reading as always, as always any feedback is appreciated on this- or any other blog. We've gotten one game left for the Calendar Year but there are also a "2014 in Review" and "January Transfer Window Preview" blogs coming before we hit 2015 so stay tuned for all four of those blogs which are still to come- thanks again and lets move onto Brighton.
Considering our defensive- and Bournemouths offensive records we didn't disgrace ourselves by any means to "only" lose 2-0, and this was somewhat similar to the Middlesborough game where we could have kept it at 1-0 had we tried to settle as opposed to pushing forward for an equaliser. The first goal came from our old nemesis- set pieces, it seems as though no matter what defence we play- what manager we have we simply can't defend corners on a consistent basis and we were punished again today. The second goal came from Fofana losing the ball- and when I get onto the midfield I'm not sure why he was still on the pitch at this point and the Arter goal was a good one and not a goal anyone could really have done anything about considering we were pushing numbers forward in an attempt to get the equaliser.
Once again Bettinelli was great, unless I'm mistaken he's saved 2 of the 3 Penalties he's faced for us this season and on top of the Penalty Save he also made a number of saves that kept us in the game. Similar to the Brentford game even though he conceded two goals he was our Man of the Match from the game by a clear margin and didn't really deserve to be on the losing team.
The defensive performance wasn't amazing, but in comparison to some of the games we've had away from home we were infinitely better. Considering the team we were playing against, with the threat they posed from nearly everyone I thought we coped pretty well with them. We coped with the majority of crosses into the box well enough- and we largely reduced them to half chances and shots from outside the box. I thought Grimmer was the worst out of the defenders we had today, his performances seem to vary greatly- although the performance today could be put down to the opposition. The Hutchinson-Bodurov partnership is still looking like our best one at present, and going into the Brighton game where Bent will presumably be starting we might as well stick with the Centre-Back partnership that kept him quiet for the majority of the game a month ago. I thought Stafylidis looked pretty solid today, he was pretty wasteful when he was going forward in my opinion- but that isn't a new occurence. Considering Bournemouths scoring record, and I think when we conceded early on we were fearing another 5-0 drubbing- but all things considered I'm pretty satisfied with our defensive efforts for the game today.
The midfield was an interesting battle today, firstly I think Kit got his tactics wrong with regard to the midfield today. I think we should have gone for a traditional 4-4-2 with George Williams and Pat Roberts coming in for Fofana and Ruiz, and this would have allowed us to counter with a lot of pace and be pretty dangerous considering Daniels and Francis aren't the fastest full-backs in the world. As such we stuck with the same team we played against Sheffield Wednesday, which I fundamentally disagree with because we should have prioritised the Brighton game where (despite their result today) the points are for the taking and it will be interesting to see how we shape up for the game on Monday. Unless Christensen was injured- which I'm praying he wasn't, I don't see a logical reason why Kit took LVC off instead of Fofana or Ruiz considering he's been our most potent midfielder this season and out of the three is the most likely to make something happen in the type of game we found ourselves in today. As such we took him off, and (an injury notwithstanding) I hope that sub was made with an eye on Monday where LVC will hopefully run the show. As such we kept Fofana on for the whole game, and he was at fault (to an extent) for the 2nd goal- but in the scenario we were in by that point I don't mind conceding another if we were properly hunting for an equaliser as we were doing. Bryan was pretty ineffective today, as I predicted he would be; however I don't see a reason why he shouldn't be able to play on Monday given the energy- or lack thereof he expended in the game today. I'll talk about it more with the Striker section, but the midfield today were largely shut out of the game today- which you have to credit Bournemouth for but this isn't a game where we should make sweeping judgements over our midfield for that exact reason.
As I've just referred to McCormack and Hugo in particular were completely devoid of service in todays game. The way we've played- even under "him" we've always had a clear chance that we should have put away- and that didn't really come today there were a few half chances but there wasn't a moment where you went "he should have scored that". As I've said though, considering the way Bournemouth defended today this isn't the game to make a sweeping judgement from- I've seen some people calling for Hugo to be dropped and that is complete nonsense, just because he was completely starved today doesn't mean he should be dropped; in my opinion he played pretty well against Sheffield Wednesday contrary to what some people have said and those are the two games he hasn't scored in after he scored in 4 of our last 5. McCormack was on balance our most dangerous player today, he looked like would make things happen- which is a common theme with him, in the second half of the season and aside from a goal there wasn't really much more McCormack could have done.
The subs we made frustrated me, as I said I don't think Christensen should have come off unless he was injured- but we eventually were playing the team I suggested starting with, and we started really pressuring Bournemouth when we did have that team. There is going to be an inevitable debate as to whether George Williams dived, I haven't seen a clear angle- and even if there was a Football League Show tonight (which there isn't) I doubt we'll see it from a proper "TV" angle so we'll be left to wonder and blow up pictures from the standard side-on angle to try and spot a touch on him. Roberts and Woodrow weren't really on long enough to make an impact- and that is one area where Kit has to improve as Roberts and Woodrow do have the ability to change the dynamic of a game- but bringing them on when the Clock starts with an "8" isn't giving them much time to bed into the game and do so.
As the title suggests I'm not going overboard as a result of one loss, we do need to have some perspective- we were playing a team who's last loss in the League was September 30th, a team who score goals for fun usually a team who under "him" would have swept us aside most likely reaching double figures in doing so. I'm never "happy" to lose, but I like to think of myself as reasonably level-headed and I accept we can't win every game but what I'm happy with from the game is that we pushed top of the league to the absolute brink and we could have kept it at 1 if we so wished in my opinion.
We're now exactly half way through the season, as a result of the games today we're 15th- which going into the season many people would've seen as an abject failure. However, after the first 8 games to be where we are I'm reasonably happy. You also have to consider we've played 5 of the Top 6 Away from home already this season, while I'm not saying we are guaranteed to pick up points at home to Bournemouth, Derby, Ipswich, Brentford and Middlesborough we are definitely more likely to- and if we are serious about even getting close to the Top 6 we need to. That combined with the fact we won't be giving other teams an 8 games head-start for the back 23 means I'm still quite hopeful of being in and around the playoffs given the points tally we've accumulated in the 15 Games we've had under Kit. We've got one game left of this calendar year on Monday- and if we win and results go our way we'll be Top Half going into the New Year and that will give us a foundation to build on for 2015.
Finally, what in gods name were we wearing today- I think White-Orange-White has to go down as one of our more bizarre combinations.
Thanks for reading as always, as always any feedback is appreciated on this- or any other blog. We've gotten one game left for the Calendar Year but there are also a "2014 in Review" and "January Transfer Window Preview" blogs coming before we hit 2015 so stay tuned for all four of those blogs which are still to come- thanks again and lets move onto Brighton.
Tuesday 23 December 2014
RAW Review- 22nd December
Hey! With my penultimate RAW Review of the year to follow, and the promise of a festive RAW the question for this was; how bad will it get?
Ho Ho Hogan, Cena, Rollins Promo
I didn't make a "Santa with Muscles" joke last night and I won't now, Brother. Hogan did the best with what he was given, but at the end of the day- what on earth were they thinking having HULK HOGAN dress up as Santa, especially when Foley seems to live for it. If the dirtsheets are to be believed Cena rallied the Main Roster after the NXT Special trying to get them to step their game up and get serious- so he started singing Disney Songs. The Rollins promo was good, but at this stage we've heard the exact same promo so many different times its starting to lose its meaning- and the crowd aren't even reacting as much as they used to.
John Cena v Seth Rollins
I was saying in my RAW Review last week that "Supercena" doesn't really bother me anymore, and I still maintain that now. Yes, he ripped through J+J as well as Rollins but going into the match with Brock he does need to look ridiculously strong to still be taken seriously. Whether or not he needed to go over Rollins to "win the feud" before moving onto Brock is more of a debate to be had, I'd have just let this feud simmer for a while after having Rollins win via Brock to keep the "Rollins Can't Pin or Submit Me" angle going for a little while longer with both guys moving on to different opponents between now and the Rumble. However they didn't, the match itself was really good- considering the usual match quality on Festive RAWs this was a welcome opener and put me in a good mood for the rest of the show.
Fandango v Jack Swagger
This was a ridiculously short match, considering the way Swaggers been booked against Rusev recently- for him to be dispatched quickly by Fandango reaffirms Swagger suffering from the most schizophrenic booking on the current roster.
R-Truth v Adam Rose
IT HAPPENED, THE LSD FINALLY WORE OFF! KRUGAH
Roman Reigns v Big Show
This didn't even make Roman look strong, DAMMIT.
Brie Bella v Natalya
So it looks as though Nattie is next in line for the Divas Title, which is alright in my book as it means Tyson will get more TV Time, FACT.
The Dusts v Los Matadores & El Reno (Thanks @Abuckley000 for the Spelling)
This was the first stupid Christmas gimmick match of the night, and it wasn't horrendous as some of them can be, Reno nearly botching the finish aside it was an alright match everything considered.
Dolph Ziggler v Luke Harper- Intercontinental Title Match
We got another great match from these two. Of course Dolph is the guy getting all the credit, because he's Dolph Ziggler but the old saying "It takes two to Tango" is never more applicable and massive credit has to go to Harper for his role in the match also. Right from the gate Harper went full throttle, and despite the number of times he's now done it I'm still impressed by a guy of Harpers build doing a proper suicide dive. The spot where Harper no-sold the superkick and went into the lariat was great and the way in which Dolph finally dispatched Harper made everyone look good.
Also... MICHAEL COLE CALLED A WRESTLING MOVE- THIS IS NOT A DRILL
I was saying on Twitter last night that Dolph needs to drop the belt soon, at the latest the Rumble and I stand by that. I said in my TLC blogs that the IC Title is a glass ceiling that Dolph has already crashed through and I stand by that and going into Wrestlemania Season I think Dolph is worthy of a Main Event spot going into Mania, with the likely options being Rollins or Triple H.
Pipers Pit w/ Rusev
Pipers part was kept short, but to the WWE Lawyers relief- I was saying it last week as well its crazy the people Lana has been across the mic from considering how new she is to the business. The more I think about it the more I realise this Ryback v Rusev feud is a bad idea, I can't see a scenario where Ryback will end the Rusev streak- so this feud will only hurt Ryback like his feud with Punk did in his original babyface run.
Santas Helper Six-Diva Tag Team Match
The fact Xanta Claus was referenced in this match made everything worth it. The We Want Paige chants were fully fledged last night and hopefully Vince removes his special hearing aids that filter everything he hears and wakes up to the fact Paige is a special talent.
The Miz v The overly possessive Uso
I'd have preferred more of Mizdows zany antics in the match, but given the time constraints it wasn't meant to be. I wish they'd pull the trigger on whatever they're going to do with Naomi and whether she aligns with Miz or not because we've already had a stupid number of matches with these two either in Singles or Tag Matches.
Bray Wyatt v Dean Ambrose- Miracle on 34th Street Fight
This was the third really good match of the night, they brought out all of the toys and more. The match was a bit "bitty" in my opinion, perhaps because of the stupid stipulation but it seemed very disjointed and they were moving from one spot to another as opposed to a "match". Thats not to say I didn't enjoy the match, but its gotten to the point where these twos matches have basically become spot monkeys for their matches and they need to be careful how many of these they do because coming into Mania season both of these two can't afford an injury. I hope this was the blow-off of the blow-off matches these two have had- but the Elbow Drop through the Table makes me think we might be getting one or two more matches out of these two.
Overall I was happy with the show, I was saying on Twitter Festive RAWs aren't for storyline progression being between the December PPV and a month away from the Rumble but overall this a decent RAW and I think a lot of people were being overly critical.
Thanks as always for reading, any and all feedback is appreciated- this is my last Wrestling Blow before Christmas and considering the different audiences I get for my blogs this is probably the last one the majority of you will see before Christmas so I'd like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas.
Ho Ho Hogan, Cena, Rollins Promo
I didn't make a "Santa with Muscles" joke last night and I won't now, Brother. Hogan did the best with what he was given, but at the end of the day- what on earth were they thinking having HULK HOGAN dress up as Santa, especially when Foley seems to live for it. If the dirtsheets are to be believed Cena rallied the Main Roster after the NXT Special trying to get them to step their game up and get serious- so he started singing Disney Songs. The Rollins promo was good, but at this stage we've heard the exact same promo so many different times its starting to lose its meaning- and the crowd aren't even reacting as much as they used to.
John Cena v Seth Rollins
I was saying in my RAW Review last week that "Supercena" doesn't really bother me anymore, and I still maintain that now. Yes, he ripped through J+J as well as Rollins but going into the match with Brock he does need to look ridiculously strong to still be taken seriously. Whether or not he needed to go over Rollins to "win the feud" before moving onto Brock is more of a debate to be had, I'd have just let this feud simmer for a while after having Rollins win via Brock to keep the "Rollins Can't Pin or Submit Me" angle going for a little while longer with both guys moving on to different opponents between now and the Rumble. However they didn't, the match itself was really good- considering the usual match quality on Festive RAWs this was a welcome opener and put me in a good mood for the rest of the show.
Fandango v Jack Swagger
This was a ridiculously short match, considering the way Swaggers been booked against Rusev recently- for him to be dispatched quickly by Fandango reaffirms Swagger suffering from the most schizophrenic booking on the current roster.
R-Truth v Adam Rose
IT HAPPENED, THE LSD FINALLY WORE OFF! KRUGAH
Roman Reigns v Big Show
This didn't even make Roman look strong, DAMMIT.
Brie Bella v Natalya
So it looks as though Nattie is next in line for the Divas Title, which is alright in my book as it means Tyson will get more TV Time, FACT.
The Dusts v Los Matadores & El Reno (Thanks @Abuckley000 for the Spelling)
This was the first stupid Christmas gimmick match of the night, and it wasn't horrendous as some of them can be, Reno nearly botching the finish aside it was an alright match everything considered.
Dolph Ziggler v Luke Harper- Intercontinental Title Match
We got another great match from these two. Of course Dolph is the guy getting all the credit, because he's Dolph Ziggler but the old saying "It takes two to Tango" is never more applicable and massive credit has to go to Harper for his role in the match also. Right from the gate Harper went full throttle, and despite the number of times he's now done it I'm still impressed by a guy of Harpers build doing a proper suicide dive. The spot where Harper no-sold the superkick and went into the lariat was great and the way in which Dolph finally dispatched Harper made everyone look good.
Also... MICHAEL COLE CALLED A WRESTLING MOVE- THIS IS NOT A DRILL
I was saying on Twitter last night that Dolph needs to drop the belt soon, at the latest the Rumble and I stand by that. I said in my TLC blogs that the IC Title is a glass ceiling that Dolph has already crashed through and I stand by that and going into Wrestlemania Season I think Dolph is worthy of a Main Event spot going into Mania, with the likely options being Rollins or Triple H.
Pipers Pit w/ Rusev
Pipers part was kept short, but to the WWE Lawyers relief- I was saying it last week as well its crazy the people Lana has been across the mic from considering how new she is to the business. The more I think about it the more I realise this Ryback v Rusev feud is a bad idea, I can't see a scenario where Ryback will end the Rusev streak- so this feud will only hurt Ryback like his feud with Punk did in his original babyface run.
Santas Helper Six-Diva Tag Team Match
The fact Xanta Claus was referenced in this match made everything worth it. The We Want Paige chants were fully fledged last night and hopefully Vince removes his special hearing aids that filter everything he hears and wakes up to the fact Paige is a special talent.
The Miz v The overly possessive Uso
I'd have preferred more of Mizdows zany antics in the match, but given the time constraints it wasn't meant to be. I wish they'd pull the trigger on whatever they're going to do with Naomi and whether she aligns with Miz or not because we've already had a stupid number of matches with these two either in Singles or Tag Matches.
Bray Wyatt v Dean Ambrose- Miracle on 34th Street Fight
This was the third really good match of the night, they brought out all of the toys and more. The match was a bit "bitty" in my opinion, perhaps because of the stupid stipulation but it seemed very disjointed and they were moving from one spot to another as opposed to a "match". Thats not to say I didn't enjoy the match, but its gotten to the point where these twos matches have basically become spot monkeys for their matches and they need to be careful how many of these they do because coming into Mania season both of these two can't afford an injury. I hope this was the blow-off of the blow-off matches these two have had- but the Elbow Drop through the Table makes me think we might be getting one or two more matches out of these two.
Overall I was happy with the show, I was saying on Twitter Festive RAWs aren't for storyline progression being between the December PPV and a month away from the Rumble but overall this a decent RAW and I think a lot of people were being overly critical.
Thanks as always for reading, any and all feedback is appreciated- this is my last Wrestling Blow before Christmas and considering the different audiences I get for my blogs this is probably the last one the majority of you will see before Christmas so I'd like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas.
Bournemouth v Fulham Preview: Blind Optimism
Hey! We're here with another blog, and we're heading to the seaside to face top of the League Bournemouth. This is pretty much the hardest game we can have, and in the festive season where games come thick and fast its possibly the worst time for this game to come around as well. However, with absolutely no foundation for this claim- I think we have a shot of getting something from this game.
By all logic we're going to get destroyed on Boxing Day, despite our back to back Clean Sheets we still have the joint worst defence in the League (and thats only because Bournemouth put 6 past Blackpool at the Weekend), and we're facing off against the highest scoring team in the League by a clear margin. That combined with the fact we've only beaten two of the top twelves, and none of the top twelve away from home. We'll definitely struggle, as Russell Slade put it Bournemouth are the "yardstick" at the moment but on absolutely no logical basis I think we could get something from the game.
One player who'll have to be on top of his game is Bettinelli. We've seen he's very much capable of keeping us in a game with his performance against Brentford and he'll have to put in a similar performance against Bournemouth for us to have any chance. He looked quite iffy from crosses against Sheffield Wednesday, but apart from that there wasn't anything wrong with Bettinelli's performance- however Wednesday had a grand total of two shots on target so its hardly a good game to judge on considering Bournemouth clear 10 shots on target regularly.
The defence will be another area where we need to be at the top of our game in order for us to have any chance of getting something from the game, I used the phrase "If it isn't broken, don't fix it" in my Sheffield Wednesday preview- and there is no reason the same doesn't apply to our defence for this game as well, contrary to what some people believed Stafylidis isn't suspended for getting 5 Yellows as the cut off date was the end of November for that. Stafylidis will be going up against Matt Ritchie- someone who'll be a regular on this blog over the next few days (and hopefully months) this'll be his biggest test yet and I think the best way to deal with him is similar to what we did with Nathan Redmond and double up on him. Facing a combination of Callum Wilson and Kermorgant/Pitman will really challenge our defence and with the Pace of Wilson we definitely need to keep the combination of Hutchinson and Bodurov as we saw against Watford how Dan Burn copes with pace.
As I referred too earlier, we'll most likely have to double up on Matt Ritchie to sufficiently neutralise him- and even then we may not. In my opinion we need to revert to a traditional 4-4-2 to counter theirs and that'll entail changes to the lineup. This'll of course mean leaving out two of the central midfielders we regularly play, with two games in quick succession I'd rest Parker and Ruiz. Parker because he's just coming off the back of an illness and he's got some of the oldest legs on the team. I'd also rest Ruiz more because we saw against Brentford he simply doesn't fit the 4-4-2 system, and I'd rather we kept him fresh for what will most likely be his last game in a Fulham shirt against Brighton. With Fofana and Christensen playing centrally we of course need two wingers, and the obvious selections are George Williams and Pat Roberts both of whom played well with their sub appearances against Sheffield Wednesday and against the Full-Backs of Simon Francis and Charlie Daniels we need to use their pace advantage to try and get in behind their back line- similar to the way Liverpool did in the Carling Cup last week.
A 4-4-2 of course means two up-front and there is no reason to change a working formula, the McCormack and Rodallega partnership has been working wonders for us- so there is no real reason to change it. There is of course an argument for resting either/or because despite the Brighton news thats come out recently with regard to Hyypia the Brighton game is definitely more winnable than the Bournemouth game so perhaps we should be prioritising it. So that would mean bringing in Woodrow, most likely for Rodallega as McCormack is a player that can make us tick- combined with the fact that as I've said on numerous occasions Hugo isn't a Target Man, however if we are to get near the playoffs we need to start getting points off of the teams above us and the way to do that is to have our best attackers on the pitch as often as possible.
Team for Bournemouth:
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Roberts, Fofana, Christensen, G. Williams
Rodallega McCormack
As I've said throughout the blog, we will by all logic lose- call it Christmas cheer, blind optimism or being delusional but I honestly do think we can get something from the game and with our attacking threat, and combinations of McCormack and Hugo and Christensen and Hugo we will definitely pose an attacking threat, and if we can continue our defensive performances- not necessarily keeping a Clean Sheet but avoiding a Cricket Score we do have a fighting chance.
Thanks as always for reading, as you may have noticed this is up earlier than usual- but the last thing anyone wants to do on either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day is read my ramblings about Fulham. As always any feedback is appreciated and lets try and stay positive- because you never know it could be a Christmas Miracle.
By all logic we're going to get destroyed on Boxing Day, despite our back to back Clean Sheets we still have the joint worst defence in the League (and thats only because Bournemouth put 6 past Blackpool at the Weekend), and we're facing off against the highest scoring team in the League by a clear margin. That combined with the fact we've only beaten two of the top twelves, and none of the top twelve away from home. We'll definitely struggle, as Russell Slade put it Bournemouth are the "yardstick" at the moment but on absolutely no logical basis I think we could get something from the game.
One player who'll have to be on top of his game is Bettinelli. We've seen he's very much capable of keeping us in a game with his performance against Brentford and he'll have to put in a similar performance against Bournemouth for us to have any chance. He looked quite iffy from crosses against Sheffield Wednesday, but apart from that there wasn't anything wrong with Bettinelli's performance- however Wednesday had a grand total of two shots on target so its hardly a good game to judge on considering Bournemouth clear 10 shots on target regularly.
The defence will be another area where we need to be at the top of our game in order for us to have any chance of getting something from the game, I used the phrase "If it isn't broken, don't fix it" in my Sheffield Wednesday preview- and there is no reason the same doesn't apply to our defence for this game as well, contrary to what some people believed Stafylidis isn't suspended for getting 5 Yellows as the cut off date was the end of November for that. Stafylidis will be going up against Matt Ritchie- someone who'll be a regular on this blog over the next few days (and hopefully months) this'll be his biggest test yet and I think the best way to deal with him is similar to what we did with Nathan Redmond and double up on him. Facing a combination of Callum Wilson and Kermorgant/Pitman will really challenge our defence and with the Pace of Wilson we definitely need to keep the combination of Hutchinson and Bodurov as we saw against Watford how Dan Burn copes with pace.
As I referred too earlier, we'll most likely have to double up on Matt Ritchie to sufficiently neutralise him- and even then we may not. In my opinion we need to revert to a traditional 4-4-2 to counter theirs and that'll entail changes to the lineup. This'll of course mean leaving out two of the central midfielders we regularly play, with two games in quick succession I'd rest Parker and Ruiz. Parker because he's just coming off the back of an illness and he's got some of the oldest legs on the team. I'd also rest Ruiz more because we saw against Brentford he simply doesn't fit the 4-4-2 system, and I'd rather we kept him fresh for what will most likely be his last game in a Fulham shirt against Brighton. With Fofana and Christensen playing centrally we of course need two wingers, and the obvious selections are George Williams and Pat Roberts both of whom played well with their sub appearances against Sheffield Wednesday and against the Full-Backs of Simon Francis and Charlie Daniels we need to use their pace advantage to try and get in behind their back line- similar to the way Liverpool did in the Carling Cup last week.
A 4-4-2 of course means two up-front and there is no reason to change a working formula, the McCormack and Rodallega partnership has been working wonders for us- so there is no real reason to change it. There is of course an argument for resting either/or because despite the Brighton news thats come out recently with regard to Hyypia the Brighton game is definitely more winnable than the Bournemouth game so perhaps we should be prioritising it. So that would mean bringing in Woodrow, most likely for Rodallega as McCormack is a player that can make us tick- combined with the fact that as I've said on numerous occasions Hugo isn't a Target Man, however if we are to get near the playoffs we need to start getting points off of the teams above us and the way to do that is to have our best attackers on the pitch as often as possible.
Team for Bournemouth:
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Roberts, Fofana, Christensen, G. Williams
Rodallega McCormack
As I've said throughout the blog, we will by all logic lose- call it Christmas cheer, blind optimism or being delusional but I honestly do think we can get something from the game and with our attacking threat, and combinations of McCormack and Hugo and Christensen and Hugo we will definitely pose an attacking threat, and if we can continue our defensive performances- not necessarily keeping a Clean Sheet but avoiding a Cricket Score we do have a fighting chance.
Thanks as always for reading, as you may have noticed this is up earlier than usual- but the last thing anyone wants to do on either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day is read my ramblings about Fulham. As always any feedback is appreciated and lets try and stay positive- because you never know it could be a Christmas Miracle.
Saturday 20 December 2014
Fulham v Sheffield Wednesday Review: An Early Christmas Present
Hey! Well that was a weird one wasn't it. Yes, we won 4-0 but there were long periods of the game where we were second best and ridiculously frustrating to watch. But as I've said in previous blogs when we've won, and won as we have done its no use breaking down every single detail and analysing how we could have scored 5 rather than 4.
I'd also like to preempt this by saying the Sheffield Wednesday fans were quality all game, they could have easily faded away but if anything they got better the more goals we scored- yes during the game we want to wind them up, but once you sit back and reflect on the game you have to respect the 4000 (approx) Wednesday fans being as they were.
At the time McCormack was lining the Free-Kick up we were second best and didn't really look like making much happen. Then McCormack proved why we spent 50 Billion on him with an absolute peach of a Free-Kick, I was expecting Bryan to take it because of where it was located- but obviously I'm not complaining. Speaking of Bryan his delivery for Hutchinsons goal was inch perfect, Ruiz's deadball delivery is somewhat questionable most of the time- but you can't argue with his delivery today and Hutchinson took the header well and got his first goal in a Fulham shirt. I'm sounding like a broken record as of late, but HOW GOOD IS LASSE VIGEN CHRISTENSEN! The move for the third goal started and ended with LVC tucking the ball away and effectively killing the game, I'd also like to briefly touch on how unselfish it was of Hugo to lay the ball off to him when he could have easily shot- and with the form and confidence he currently has I wouldn't necessarily have been angry with him if he had. Speaking of unselfishness (see how I'm tying all these together) the Penalty was another example of what I've been talking about nearly all season- McCormack is so much more than a goalscorer, that much has been established but the fact he let Woodrow have the Penalty spoke volumes for him as a personality, and a man. I didn't see the foul for the Penalty from a clear angle- sitting in H2 relatively near to the pitch you sometimes don't get a clear view of stuff going on, on the other side of the box, what I did see clearly however was a clear penalty not given to Woodrow not long before that decision, and I have to assume that decision was weighing on Andre Marriners mind when he gave the Penalty late on.
Bettinelli came back in today, and despite all of the pressing Wednesday did he was never bombarded- I don't even remember a save that made me go "Wow", which Bettinelli has made a habit of- mind you I'm not complaining that Bettinelli wasn't kept busy. The thing that rankles a bit about the Penalty not being given against Westwood was it was a carbon copy of the Penalty Bettinelli gave away to Watford two weeks ago (albeit a bit further out).
We've kept our first set of consecutive clean sheets this season- and god knows how long ago it was when yo consider how woeful some of our defending has been in the past few seasons. I thought this was Grimmers best game in a Fulham shirt, he looked relatively comfortable given he was up against Helan- who was causing problems for the whole of our defence all of the first half and he's really staking a claim to remain in the team when Hoogland is back fit and that could turn into one of the more interesting debates to be had in the near future. Stafylidis (who with his new haircut made me mistake him for Chris David when they were warming up) was really good today. Firstly, his Yellow Card wasn't a Yellow Card- not only did he get the ball but it was an absolutely brilliant tackle. As I said I sit in H2 relatively close to the pitch- close enough to see that Maguire was smiling after he saw he'd gotten Stafylidis booked. He managed to win a lot of his 1-on-1s and is starting to show he has a really good head on him, I was convinced he was going to get a 2nd Yellow in the Second Half. I'm back to my Bodurov love-fest again this week, as I said in my Leeds Review I've had a lot of time for Bodurov since the Norwich game, so even when he put in a few iffy performances I wasn't going to call for him to be dropped or anything drastic- even after Watford and he proved his mettle again today, his performance was summed up at roughly 30 minutes when he put in an absolutely inch perfect tackle on Stevie May (I think) to break up an attack. Hutchinson on top of his goal also had a really good defensive display, to be fair Wednesday looked pretty toothless despite their wing play from Helan and in the second half Drenthe but I thought Hutchinson dealt with everything quite well, and when we keep a Clean Sheet theres not much more you can ask for.
Broken Record time, Lasse Vigen Christensen is an absolute gem. He's playing confidently and is really influencing the game in a way that is miles beyond the number of appearances he's had for the first team, and if the voting were to be done tomorrow for our Player of the Year he'd win by a mile in my opinion. I was also really impressed by Seko Fofana today, excluding the Watford game (as everyone was bad that game) he's been more impressive every time I've seen him play, he played like a proper Box to Box midfielder today and if he hadn't have picked up a stupid yellow card and then looked in danger of getting another he might have gotten a goal before the end of the game. I wasn't convinced by Parker today, he lost the ball a bit too easily for my liking- and slowed the ball down a bit too much for my liking. I accept that is the way Parker plays, and just wish we'd diversify a bit and rotate the player linking the defence and attack so we can attack with a bit more pace. I thought Bryan had an alright game, you're not expecting him to be a workhorse type midfielder- what you want him to do is do exactly what he did and link the play up and have some good interplay with McCormack and Rodallega and put in a good Free-Kick delivery for the second goal.
We had a rare occurrence of a McCormack goal at the Cottage today (just his second) and its a strange one because I've see him play a lot better and not get a goal, I thought he was quite hit and miss today- he was drifting out wide a lot and perhaps because of the speed of our build-up play he didn't get into the game as much as he usually does, and in turn didn't have as much of an impact on the game as he usually does. But, in games where he doesn't impact the game as much he's shown he can score goals (and quality ones) and that can be even more vital when it comes to tight games where 1 Goal will settle it. The only massive thing wrong with todays game, and its something I've been saying since Kit came in really- HUGO IS NOT A TARGET MAN. We've consistently persisted with hoofing long balls up to Hugo since Kit came in, and Hugo has probably won about three of them. As I've said there is no way we should drop Hugo in favour of someone else, we just need to rethink how we're going to play our game- and hopefully with January around the corner we can sign people to either adapt to a more "appealing" style of football with would suit Hugo or sign people to adapt a bit more to a long ball type of game.
For once the subs we used actually had a substantial impact on the game. When Williams came on for Fofana, perhaps out of necessity I was hoping we'd use his pace to launch proper Counter-Attacks and although the Counter we did score from was started by Christensen we definitely looked a lot more dangerous on them once Williams came on. Woodrow of course scored the Penalty, and should have won the Penalty which is a reminder that we do have options if we need them. Roberts won the Penalty and in his very limited appearance he showed why he can still be a danger to the opposition.
Overall that was a weird game, we looked pretty weak in the first half but still found ourselves 2-0 up and that kind of summed up the whole game. We don't need to perform amazing for every minute of every game as long as we pick the three points up at the end of the game and keep climbing that table. Of course with the 4 Goal winning margin we've gone above Wednesday in the table and we're on the cusp of the Top Half. If we can scrape into the Top Half before 2015 comes around I'll be over the moon and it'll leave us with a good foundation to launch a push for the playoffs.
Thanks for reading as per usual, This is of course my last Fulham blog before Christmas so I want to thank all of you guys for reading this- and any of my other blogs I've done since I started in the Summer and want to wish you all a Very Happy Christmas.
I'd also like to preempt this by saying the Sheffield Wednesday fans were quality all game, they could have easily faded away but if anything they got better the more goals we scored- yes during the game we want to wind them up, but once you sit back and reflect on the game you have to respect the 4000 (approx) Wednesday fans being as they were.
At the time McCormack was lining the Free-Kick up we were second best and didn't really look like making much happen. Then McCormack proved why we spent 50 Billion on him with an absolute peach of a Free-Kick, I was expecting Bryan to take it because of where it was located- but obviously I'm not complaining. Speaking of Bryan his delivery for Hutchinsons goal was inch perfect, Ruiz's deadball delivery is somewhat questionable most of the time- but you can't argue with his delivery today and Hutchinson took the header well and got his first goal in a Fulham shirt. I'm sounding like a broken record as of late, but HOW GOOD IS LASSE VIGEN CHRISTENSEN! The move for the third goal started and ended with LVC tucking the ball away and effectively killing the game, I'd also like to briefly touch on how unselfish it was of Hugo to lay the ball off to him when he could have easily shot- and with the form and confidence he currently has I wouldn't necessarily have been angry with him if he had. Speaking of unselfishness (see how I'm tying all these together) the Penalty was another example of what I've been talking about nearly all season- McCormack is so much more than a goalscorer, that much has been established but the fact he let Woodrow have the Penalty spoke volumes for him as a personality, and a man. I didn't see the foul for the Penalty from a clear angle- sitting in H2 relatively near to the pitch you sometimes don't get a clear view of stuff going on, on the other side of the box, what I did see clearly however was a clear penalty not given to Woodrow not long before that decision, and I have to assume that decision was weighing on Andre Marriners mind when he gave the Penalty late on.
Bettinelli came back in today, and despite all of the pressing Wednesday did he was never bombarded- I don't even remember a save that made me go "Wow", which Bettinelli has made a habit of- mind you I'm not complaining that Bettinelli wasn't kept busy. The thing that rankles a bit about the Penalty not being given against Westwood was it was a carbon copy of the Penalty Bettinelli gave away to Watford two weeks ago (albeit a bit further out).
We've kept our first set of consecutive clean sheets this season- and god knows how long ago it was when yo consider how woeful some of our defending has been in the past few seasons. I thought this was Grimmers best game in a Fulham shirt, he looked relatively comfortable given he was up against Helan- who was causing problems for the whole of our defence all of the first half and he's really staking a claim to remain in the team when Hoogland is back fit and that could turn into one of the more interesting debates to be had in the near future. Stafylidis (who with his new haircut made me mistake him for Chris David when they were warming up) was really good today. Firstly, his Yellow Card wasn't a Yellow Card- not only did he get the ball but it was an absolutely brilliant tackle. As I said I sit in H2 relatively close to the pitch- close enough to see that Maguire was smiling after he saw he'd gotten Stafylidis booked. He managed to win a lot of his 1-on-1s and is starting to show he has a really good head on him, I was convinced he was going to get a 2nd Yellow in the Second Half. I'm back to my Bodurov love-fest again this week, as I said in my Leeds Review I've had a lot of time for Bodurov since the Norwich game, so even when he put in a few iffy performances I wasn't going to call for him to be dropped or anything drastic- even after Watford and he proved his mettle again today, his performance was summed up at roughly 30 minutes when he put in an absolutely inch perfect tackle on Stevie May (I think) to break up an attack. Hutchinson on top of his goal also had a really good defensive display, to be fair Wednesday looked pretty toothless despite their wing play from Helan and in the second half Drenthe but I thought Hutchinson dealt with everything quite well, and when we keep a Clean Sheet theres not much more you can ask for.
Broken Record time, Lasse Vigen Christensen is an absolute gem. He's playing confidently and is really influencing the game in a way that is miles beyond the number of appearances he's had for the first team, and if the voting were to be done tomorrow for our Player of the Year he'd win by a mile in my opinion. I was also really impressed by Seko Fofana today, excluding the Watford game (as everyone was bad that game) he's been more impressive every time I've seen him play, he played like a proper Box to Box midfielder today and if he hadn't have picked up a stupid yellow card and then looked in danger of getting another he might have gotten a goal before the end of the game. I wasn't convinced by Parker today, he lost the ball a bit too easily for my liking- and slowed the ball down a bit too much for my liking. I accept that is the way Parker plays, and just wish we'd diversify a bit and rotate the player linking the defence and attack so we can attack with a bit more pace. I thought Bryan had an alright game, you're not expecting him to be a workhorse type midfielder- what you want him to do is do exactly what he did and link the play up and have some good interplay with McCormack and Rodallega and put in a good Free-Kick delivery for the second goal.
We had a rare occurrence of a McCormack goal at the Cottage today (just his second) and its a strange one because I've see him play a lot better and not get a goal, I thought he was quite hit and miss today- he was drifting out wide a lot and perhaps because of the speed of our build-up play he didn't get into the game as much as he usually does, and in turn didn't have as much of an impact on the game as he usually does. But, in games where he doesn't impact the game as much he's shown he can score goals (and quality ones) and that can be even more vital when it comes to tight games where 1 Goal will settle it. The only massive thing wrong with todays game, and its something I've been saying since Kit came in really- HUGO IS NOT A TARGET MAN. We've consistently persisted with hoofing long balls up to Hugo since Kit came in, and Hugo has probably won about three of them. As I've said there is no way we should drop Hugo in favour of someone else, we just need to rethink how we're going to play our game- and hopefully with January around the corner we can sign people to either adapt to a more "appealing" style of football with would suit Hugo or sign people to adapt a bit more to a long ball type of game.
For once the subs we used actually had a substantial impact on the game. When Williams came on for Fofana, perhaps out of necessity I was hoping we'd use his pace to launch proper Counter-Attacks and although the Counter we did score from was started by Christensen we definitely looked a lot more dangerous on them once Williams came on. Woodrow of course scored the Penalty, and should have won the Penalty which is a reminder that we do have options if we need them. Roberts won the Penalty and in his very limited appearance he showed why he can still be a danger to the opposition.
Overall that was a weird game, we looked pretty weak in the first half but still found ourselves 2-0 up and that kind of summed up the whole game. We don't need to perform amazing for every minute of every game as long as we pick the three points up at the end of the game and keep climbing that table. Of course with the 4 Goal winning margin we've gone above Wednesday in the table and we're on the cusp of the Top Half. If we can scrape into the Top Half before 2015 comes around I'll be over the moon and it'll leave us with a good foundation to launch a push for the playoffs.
Thanks for reading as per usual, This is of course my last Fulham blog before Christmas so I want to thank all of you guys for reading this- and any of my other blogs I've done since I started in the Summer and want to wish you all a Very Happy Christmas.
Friday 19 December 2014
Fulham v Sheffield Wednesday Preview: Festive Cheer
Hey! We've got another blog, I've gotten into the habit of these being weekly as of late; but as the title suggest we're coming into the festive period and the blogs'll be coming thick and fast. As well as the three games we have before January, there'll also be a January Transfer Window Preview blog and (maybe) a 2014 Year in Review blog. So as you can tell I'm going to be quite busy. Now onto what we all came for!
Before I get into my usual team selection stuff there was a few things from Kits Press Conference I picked up on and would like to talk about. Firstly, I'm not sure where the McCormack rumours came from- I think from the Daily Mail; and that in itself means the rumour should be taken with a cubic metre of salt. I simply don't see a scenario where we sell McCormack until at least this summer- and that'll only be the case if we get a healthy profit on him. The biggest story when it comes to Fulham this week has probably been the recalling of Kacaniklic. I was very much in favour of us recalling him when we could, in fact if you look far back enough in my blog archive you'll see in August I was arguing for him to start- as I'm sure many others were. Assuming we sell Bryan in January, Kaca could be the player we need to implement a classic 4-4-2 successfully and provide our full-backs with more cover while in turn giving us more width. However, the first game Kaca is available for (as per Kit) is Cardiff on the 10th so its no use talking about how he'll be suited to the team until then.
We're coming up against a team with the least number of away losses in the League (1), and in terms of points won away from home Wednesday are only out done by Bournemouth and Middlesborough. With our very schizophrenic form as of late (Since Nov. 5th; WLWLW) its very hard to say how this game will go, but if we can perform like we know we can- and contrary to the Watford game actually show up we should have a good chance of picking up all three points.
As I'll be talking about when it comes to our defence, a Clean Sheet last week was huge for us- and we shouldn't be changing stuff on a whim; especially considering our defensive record. However, there is no reason Bettinelli should be kept out of the team for an indefinite period of time because of one bad mistake. Although Kiraly did have a pretty good game last week, I still don't really have faith in him as a Starting Goalkeeper for us- and with the form Bettinelli has been in he deserves to walk straight back into the team.
The defence is an interesting debate to be had for this game. You can look at it from a number of different ways- which'll I try and talk about as succinctly as possible. One argument you could use is "if it isn't broken don't fix it", that'll mean lining up with the same back four as Leeds with Hutchinson and Bodurov with Grimmer and Stafylidis as the Full-Backs. While the Full-Back places are pretty much locked until Hoogland and/or Amorebieta are back (as per Kit they're still out) the Centre-Back places are still very much a debate to be had- especially for this game. Although I'm not ridiculously clued up on Sheff. Wednesday, it doesn't take a genius to work out Nuhiu is 6'5 and will pose an aerial threat. As such you have to consider Dan Burn returning to the Starting Eleven as a viable option. However, as I said "if it isn't broken don't fix it" and I have enough faith in Bodurov and Hutchinson to deal adequately enough with the aerial threat of Nuhiu- as well as being better suited than Burn to cope with the Pace of the likes of Stevie May, and this'll especially be the case if Wednesday opt to go for Stevie May as the one up front with Drenthe, McGugan and Maguire in behind him.
With Kacaniklic coming back, presumably to start the competition for Midfield places will have gotten even hotter. As such whoever we play between now and Cardiff in the Midfield will have to stake their claim even more than they may (or may not) have already done. Lasse Vigen Christensen is fast becoming our first name on the team sheet, at this stage there is no argument to be had- he's our player of the year and with the form he's currently on anyone who would even consider dropping him needs to have a psychiatric examination. I'm guessing that Parker is back for this game, as illness generally lasts a week at the most which means its a fight between Hyndman, Fofana and (to an extent) George Williams for that third midfield place. On balance I'd go for Fofana, especially after his standout performance against Leeds I think with the Midfield three of Christensen, Parker and Fofana we might finally have found the right balance for our Narrow Diamond formation. As I seem to be saying every blog (apologies for sounding like a broken record) we need to keep Ruiz in the team for as long as we possibly can, yes he is frustrating at times- but he also has undoubted quality and (with respect) against a Midfield like Sheffield Wednesdays he could flourish and run the show like he did against Bolton.
Our striking options are as straight-forward as ever. The McCormack-Hugo partnership up front has been great thus far, and perhaps most encouragingly we're getting goals from sources other than this partnership now- and if we can tie all of it together we'll start looking like real contenders for the Playoffs which seems to be the goal of the majority of Fulham fans. I spoke in a lot more detail of Hugo's knack of scoring key goals, and although Hugo's conversion rate isn't the best- with Hugo you're almost guaranteed to get a goal if he gets enough chances and I'd be quite worried about losing Hugo in January- especially considering he's coming into the last 6 Months of his contract.
Team for Sheffield Wednesday:
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Christensen, Parker, Fofana
Ruiz
McCormack Rodallega
Thanks as always for reading, as always any feedback is appreciated. Lets just hope we don't have to expunge this home game from our memory as we did the last one. Thanks again, and lets hope it isn't too cold down at the Cottage tomorrow- I nearly froze at the Man City home game at a similar time last season.
Before I get into my usual team selection stuff there was a few things from Kits Press Conference I picked up on and would like to talk about. Firstly, I'm not sure where the McCormack rumours came from- I think from the Daily Mail; and that in itself means the rumour should be taken with a cubic metre of salt. I simply don't see a scenario where we sell McCormack until at least this summer- and that'll only be the case if we get a healthy profit on him. The biggest story when it comes to Fulham this week has probably been the recalling of Kacaniklic. I was very much in favour of us recalling him when we could, in fact if you look far back enough in my blog archive you'll see in August I was arguing for him to start- as I'm sure many others were. Assuming we sell Bryan in January, Kaca could be the player we need to implement a classic 4-4-2 successfully and provide our full-backs with more cover while in turn giving us more width. However, the first game Kaca is available for (as per Kit) is Cardiff on the 10th so its no use talking about how he'll be suited to the team until then.
We're coming up against a team with the least number of away losses in the League (1), and in terms of points won away from home Wednesday are only out done by Bournemouth and Middlesborough. With our very schizophrenic form as of late (Since Nov. 5th; WLWLW) its very hard to say how this game will go, but if we can perform like we know we can- and contrary to the Watford game actually show up we should have a good chance of picking up all three points.
As I'll be talking about when it comes to our defence, a Clean Sheet last week was huge for us- and we shouldn't be changing stuff on a whim; especially considering our defensive record. However, there is no reason Bettinelli should be kept out of the team for an indefinite period of time because of one bad mistake. Although Kiraly did have a pretty good game last week, I still don't really have faith in him as a Starting Goalkeeper for us- and with the form Bettinelli has been in he deserves to walk straight back into the team.
The defence is an interesting debate to be had for this game. You can look at it from a number of different ways- which'll I try and talk about as succinctly as possible. One argument you could use is "if it isn't broken don't fix it", that'll mean lining up with the same back four as Leeds with Hutchinson and Bodurov with Grimmer and Stafylidis as the Full-Backs. While the Full-Back places are pretty much locked until Hoogland and/or Amorebieta are back (as per Kit they're still out) the Centre-Back places are still very much a debate to be had- especially for this game. Although I'm not ridiculously clued up on Sheff. Wednesday, it doesn't take a genius to work out Nuhiu is 6'5 and will pose an aerial threat. As such you have to consider Dan Burn returning to the Starting Eleven as a viable option. However, as I said "if it isn't broken don't fix it" and I have enough faith in Bodurov and Hutchinson to deal adequately enough with the aerial threat of Nuhiu- as well as being better suited than Burn to cope with the Pace of the likes of Stevie May, and this'll especially be the case if Wednesday opt to go for Stevie May as the one up front with Drenthe, McGugan and Maguire in behind him.
With Kacaniklic coming back, presumably to start the competition for Midfield places will have gotten even hotter. As such whoever we play between now and Cardiff in the Midfield will have to stake their claim even more than they may (or may not) have already done. Lasse Vigen Christensen is fast becoming our first name on the team sheet, at this stage there is no argument to be had- he's our player of the year and with the form he's currently on anyone who would even consider dropping him needs to have a psychiatric examination. I'm guessing that Parker is back for this game, as illness generally lasts a week at the most which means its a fight between Hyndman, Fofana and (to an extent) George Williams for that third midfield place. On balance I'd go for Fofana, especially after his standout performance against Leeds I think with the Midfield three of Christensen, Parker and Fofana we might finally have found the right balance for our Narrow Diamond formation. As I seem to be saying every blog (apologies for sounding like a broken record) we need to keep Ruiz in the team for as long as we possibly can, yes he is frustrating at times- but he also has undoubted quality and (with respect) against a Midfield like Sheffield Wednesdays he could flourish and run the show like he did against Bolton.
Our striking options are as straight-forward as ever. The McCormack-Hugo partnership up front has been great thus far, and perhaps most encouragingly we're getting goals from sources other than this partnership now- and if we can tie all of it together we'll start looking like real contenders for the Playoffs which seems to be the goal of the majority of Fulham fans. I spoke in a lot more detail of Hugo's knack of scoring key goals, and although Hugo's conversion rate isn't the best- with Hugo you're almost guaranteed to get a goal if he gets enough chances and I'd be quite worried about losing Hugo in January- especially considering he's coming into the last 6 Months of his contract.
Team for Sheffield Wednesday:
Bettinelli
Grimmer, Hutchinson, Bodurov, Stafylidis
Christensen, Parker, Fofana
Ruiz
McCormack Rodallega
Thanks as always for reading, as always any feedback is appreciated. Lets just hope we don't have to expunge this home game from our memory as we did the last one. Thanks again, and lets hope it isn't too cold down at the Cottage tomorrow- I nearly froze at the Man City home game at a similar time last season.
Tuesday 16 December 2014
RAW Review: 15th December
Hey! We're back with another RAW Review, and unless I'm mistaken the last live RAW of the year- and with the godawful festive RAW we're due next week I was hoping we'd get a fair decent edition last night.
Jericho, Heyman, Rollins, Cena Promo
20 Minute Promo Segments for the win! Thats not to say I don't mind the people involved in Promo segments, however this really dragged in my opinion. The opening Jericho promo was decent, the problem with Jericho (and all the other Guest GMs) is that they don't have anything to sink their teeth into promo wise, so Jericho was reduced to his usual catchphrases until Heyman could come out. I really liked the Heyman promo, mind you theres seldom a Heyman Promo that I don't like. The Rollins promo was probably the best out of the four because it had a clear purpose. The Cena Promo was, well a Cena promo so it was hit and miss, but it did the job of setting up the two Main Events so I suppose it was alright.
Luke Harper & Big Show v Dolph Ziggler & Erick Rowan
On the one hand, we had Harper and Ziggler in the match- which by all logic would deliver. However on the other, there is no way Dolph and Harper were anywhere near 100%- and Big Show and Rowan are, well Big Show and Rowan. It was a really strange match, Dolph was doing most of the selling as per usual, but I don't know if it was because everyone was banged up after the PPV the night before- but everyone was a step off, but as I said that was understandable. It seems as though any hope Rowan would've had of a good push is now firmly dead after he was pinned clean two nights in a row.
The Bellas v Alicia Fox & Natalya
This match was another obvious indication that Total Divas was coming back... In the Bunker yet?
The Highlight Reel
Including the backstage segment with Fandango, this was the third Jericho segment in under an hour. Its weird to think the number of people Lanas had promo exchanges with given she (and Rusev) have been on the Main Roster less than a year. Ryback v Rusev is a really interesting feud from my perspective, the matches won't necessarily deliver but Rusev has been made to look unstoppable since he debuted- and Ryback since he returned as a babyface has been made to look like a wrecking ball as well. So, this'll show us how much stock they've truly put in Rusev- and his undefeated streak.
New Day v The Dusts
This match was just really uncomfortable to watch- and not in a good way. The crowd disinterest didn't help the match, but given the guys involved the match could- and should have been so much better than it was.
Kane v Adam Rose
Let me take you back to Extreme Rules, Kane was in a 25 Minute Main Event for the WWEWHC. Now he's tombstoning a Bunny.
Paul Heyman v Chris Jericho
I called Brock coming out in the first segment, so I wasn't exactly surprised when it did happen. Assuming Jericho is going to be in and around during Mania season I can see him facing Brock at Fast Track just for a filler Title match before Brock drops the belt at Mania- most likely to Reigns. The fact Brock didn't completely kill Jericho gives credence to that theory, because if they wanted to write him off the beating would've been a lot worse.
Fandango, Roman Reigns, Big Show Segment
So, does Fandango get to keep the Slammy? I'm not sure why Roman wanted to take out Fandango, especially in his Hardy Boyz T-Shirt, but he did. It seems as though they're maneuvering to Reigns v Show at the Rumble- so that'll be fun.
The Miz v Jimmy Uso
This match needed more Mizdow in my opinion, Miz needs fresh opponents to keep Mizdow fresh as well, so hopefully this feud doesn't get dragged out for more longer- or if it does they run with my idea of a Stunt Naomi. I'm not sure what good Jimmy going over did in the grand scheme of things, with the backstage promo between Miz & Naomi that followed it seems as though they're going to keep this feud going despite the fact that Jimmy has already gone over.
Seth Rollins v John Cena
I really liked this match. Yes, Cena had the match won a Million Times before shenanigans intervened- but that isn't a surprise to anyone by this point. I thought these two told a really good story given the really limited build for the match, and the way the match was built throughout the night. Again, I called the Lesnar run (walk)-in before it happened; what I didn't see coming was what happened next. I don't know if this means we're going to get Rollins as a Heyman Guy, which I'd be very much in favour of with the Money in the Bank permutations- and you'd presume a Rollins babyface turn, or a Rollins cash-in on Reigns sometime after Mania; and if it were entirely up to me I'd eventually have Reigns align with Heyman so he could deal with the Promo side of Reigns' character.
Thanks for reading, as always any feedback is appreciated. Its been a jam packed week of wrasslin- and now that its finally over I'm going to sleep until Friday when I'll be doing my Fulham v Sheffield Wednesday Preview. Thanks again, just remember this RAW was further proof that the genius of Sam is every day.
Jericho, Heyman, Rollins, Cena Promo
20 Minute Promo Segments for the win! Thats not to say I don't mind the people involved in Promo segments, however this really dragged in my opinion. The opening Jericho promo was decent, the problem with Jericho (and all the other Guest GMs) is that they don't have anything to sink their teeth into promo wise, so Jericho was reduced to his usual catchphrases until Heyman could come out. I really liked the Heyman promo, mind you theres seldom a Heyman Promo that I don't like. The Rollins promo was probably the best out of the four because it had a clear purpose. The Cena Promo was, well a Cena promo so it was hit and miss, but it did the job of setting up the two Main Events so I suppose it was alright.
Luke Harper & Big Show v Dolph Ziggler & Erick Rowan
On the one hand, we had Harper and Ziggler in the match- which by all logic would deliver. However on the other, there is no way Dolph and Harper were anywhere near 100%- and Big Show and Rowan are, well Big Show and Rowan. It was a really strange match, Dolph was doing most of the selling as per usual, but I don't know if it was because everyone was banged up after the PPV the night before- but everyone was a step off, but as I said that was understandable. It seems as though any hope Rowan would've had of a good push is now firmly dead after he was pinned clean two nights in a row.
The Bellas v Alicia Fox & Natalya
This match was another obvious indication that Total Divas was coming back... In the Bunker yet?
The Highlight Reel
Including the backstage segment with Fandango, this was the third Jericho segment in under an hour. Its weird to think the number of people Lanas had promo exchanges with given she (and Rusev) have been on the Main Roster less than a year. Ryback v Rusev is a really interesting feud from my perspective, the matches won't necessarily deliver but Rusev has been made to look unstoppable since he debuted- and Ryback since he returned as a babyface has been made to look like a wrecking ball as well. So, this'll show us how much stock they've truly put in Rusev- and his undefeated streak.
New Day v The Dusts
This match was just really uncomfortable to watch- and not in a good way. The crowd disinterest didn't help the match, but given the guys involved the match could- and should have been so much better than it was.
Kane v Adam Rose
Let me take you back to Extreme Rules, Kane was in a 25 Minute Main Event for the WWEWHC. Now he's tombstoning a Bunny.
Paul Heyman v Chris Jericho
I called Brock coming out in the first segment, so I wasn't exactly surprised when it did happen. Assuming Jericho is going to be in and around during Mania season I can see him facing Brock at Fast Track just for a filler Title match before Brock drops the belt at Mania- most likely to Reigns. The fact Brock didn't completely kill Jericho gives credence to that theory, because if they wanted to write him off the beating would've been a lot worse.
Fandango, Roman Reigns, Big Show Segment
So, does Fandango get to keep the Slammy? I'm not sure why Roman wanted to take out Fandango, especially in his Hardy Boyz T-Shirt, but he did. It seems as though they're maneuvering to Reigns v Show at the Rumble- so that'll be fun.
The Miz v Jimmy Uso
This match needed more Mizdow in my opinion, Miz needs fresh opponents to keep Mizdow fresh as well, so hopefully this feud doesn't get dragged out for more longer- or if it does they run with my idea of a Stunt Naomi. I'm not sure what good Jimmy going over did in the grand scheme of things, with the backstage promo between Miz & Naomi that followed it seems as though they're going to keep this feud going despite the fact that Jimmy has already gone over.
Seth Rollins v John Cena
I really liked this match. Yes, Cena had the match won a Million Times before shenanigans intervened- but that isn't a surprise to anyone by this point. I thought these two told a really good story given the really limited build for the match, and the way the match was built throughout the night. Again, I called the Lesnar run (walk)-in before it happened; what I didn't see coming was what happened next. I don't know if this means we're going to get Rollins as a Heyman Guy, which I'd be very much in favour of with the Money in the Bank permutations- and you'd presume a Rollins babyface turn, or a Rollins cash-in on Reigns sometime after Mania; and if it were entirely up to me I'd eventually have Reigns align with Heyman so he could deal with the Promo side of Reigns' character.
Thanks for reading, as always any feedback is appreciated. Its been a jam packed week of wrasslin- and now that its finally over I'm going to sleep until Friday when I'll be doing my Fulham v Sheffield Wednesday Preview. Thanks again, just remember this RAW was further proof that the genius of Sam is every day.
Monday 15 December 2014
TLC: Review
We're here with another blog! I saw a lot of people comparing the PPV before it even started to the NXT Special on Thursday, and while I won't do a direct comparison because they're two completely different products- with two completely different philosophies you can't help but compare some of the things involved. Especially when you consider the NXT Special was a "wrestling" product, and this PPV isn't exactly renowned for technically sound wrestling matches.
Pre-Show: New Day v Stardust & Goldust
I'll be honest, I was only half paying attention to this match, so I won't be the guy to provide a very detailed review about the match quality. I'm still not convinced about the New Day gimmick, but it does seem like they're getting over with the crowd (to an extent) each time they're on TV. As I said I wasn't really paying attention to this match because I was trying to sort out a stream for the actual PPV, until it was pointed out to me that it was on Sky Sports 1. The only thing of note in this match was Big E forgetting the mechanics behind setting up their own finisher.
Dolph Ziggler v Luke Harper: Intercontinental Title Ladder Match
This was brutal. I really like both of the guys involved in the match, and the match itself (isolated) was really good. However, the spots these two guys put together were completely brutal- as someone who's needed stitches not so long ago I couldn't help but wince at some of the spots these two guys put their bodies through. The spot where Harper dived onto Ziggler on the outside with the ladder, where he subsequently landed on his arm- on a ladder was horrendous; and Harper has to consider himself lucky he didn't do himself some serious damage. I'm trying not to ramble, so in short- the match itself was good (in my opinion Match of the Night), but two guys who still have (barring injury) years left on their careers killing themselves for (in the grand scheme of things) a pretty meaningless PPV in December didn't make much sense to me. As I'll also discuss later, giving us everything including the Kitchen Sink in the opening match didn't make much sense to me.
The Uso's v The Miz's: Tag Team Title Match
The finish for this was a complete cop out. The Uso's have little to no momentum aside from them randomly getting Tag Team of the Year whereas Mizdow is one of the most over guys in the company as it stands. Mizdow did his usual being amazing, everything about his gimmick works. from the Baby Slammy to not breaking Pinfalls because he's on his back as well. However, the focus on this match was more on the Uso's and Naomi- and that led to absolutely nothing because Miz ended up getting DQ'd. When I was doing my predictions I thought Naomi was still on Total Divas, so thats why I factored in a Naomi heel turn so I'm using that as my excuse for calling this match wrong.
Big Show v Erick Rowan: Steel Stairs Match
This match was flawed before either men took to the ring. both of the guys involved are decent workers- whatever you want to say about Big Shows pendulum tendencies. However, this match completely screwed them before they even had a fighting chance of putting on a good match.
John Cena v Seth Rollins: Tables Match
As soon as I saw this wasn't the Main Event I knew my prediction for this match was going to be wrong. I don't know why, and I'd like to preempt this with saying I do actually like Cena- I just don't like the way he's booked; Cena didn't look "on" in this match. Although Rollins is good fast paced worked, Cena can usually keep up- and he looked one step behind for the whole of this match. Its perhaps all of his years of being "the guy" catching up to him but he looked quite stiff in this match, and that affected the quality. I'm not going to get into the fact Cena had Rollins beaten at least three times, and then still went on to win because I've gotten to the point of beyond caring when it comes to Cenas "Super" antics. I thought the run-in would be a certain Viper, but Reigns coming back was just as effective- and perhaps for the best the Rumble is next month so Reigns won't be going over Rollins in a Singles Match until at least Elimination Chamber (or Fast Track or whatever its called now).
Nikki Bella v A.J.: Divas Title Match
Similar to Cena, this match just seemed "off". I don't know why, whether its just these two have very little chemistry, Nikki not being a very good worker, or A.J. not having her heart in it anymore but this match just seemed quite sloppy. The finish was stupid, and I'm just praying to god the spraying to the face wasn't a sign they're going to try and rip off the Beautiful People with The Bellas.
Ryback v Kane: Chairs Match
This match was marginally better than the Rowan v Show match, but I think thats more down to the stipulation, and the constraints placed on the guys involved as a consequence of the stipulation. This was still pretty "meh" though, and its not a match that you'll remember next week.
Rusev v Jack Swagger: US Title Match
If you read my predictions you'd have known I tipped this match to be really good, what I didn't expect was for them to have Rusev squash Swagger in roughly 5 minutes with Swagger getting in very little offence. Especially considering the amount of time there was left in the PPV, and what happened the PPV finished with roughly 10 Minutes still available to them.
Bray Wyatt v Dean Ambrose: TLC
By all logic the crowd should have been going insane due to the number of spots in this match, Off the top of my head Bray went through 3 Tables via an Ambrose Elbow Drop- one of them off a 25ft (allegedly) ladder. But this match was proof of one thing, Gimmick PPVs suck. The fact is (without counting- if someone has let me know) we'd already seen 4 or 5 Table Spots before we even got to the Main Event, and that burned out the crowd. We'd already seen brutal ladder spots, and that burned out the crowd. We'd already see false finish after false finish, and that burned out the crowd. In summary this match was proof of whats wrong with Modern "Sports Entertainment". Not the match itself, because I really liked it- but the circumstances surrounding the match were far from ideal. To give a comparison to the two products of NXT and WWE- NXT had the crowd on the edge of their feet for the whole of a 20+ Minute Main Event, and popped the crowd massively at the end. The Main Event of the WWE PPV ended with an exploding TV, because when you pull your TV wire out it explodes right?
I'd also like to give a brief mention to the great Superstar of the Year Roman Reigns botching a backstage promo, the Retweets were appreciated Roman.
Thanks for reading as ever, I'm back tomorrow for the RAW Review- and I'll be on Twitter for the usual shenanigans as well. I might even do the Live Smackdown if I haven't died from sleep deprivation by then. As always any feedback is appreciated, and lets just hope RAWs a good one, because I'm yawning now- and RAW won't be finished for nearly 12 hours.
Pre-Show: New Day v Stardust & Goldust
I'll be honest, I was only half paying attention to this match, so I won't be the guy to provide a very detailed review about the match quality. I'm still not convinced about the New Day gimmick, but it does seem like they're getting over with the crowd (to an extent) each time they're on TV. As I said I wasn't really paying attention to this match because I was trying to sort out a stream for the actual PPV, until it was pointed out to me that it was on Sky Sports 1. The only thing of note in this match was Big E forgetting the mechanics behind setting up their own finisher.
Dolph Ziggler v Luke Harper: Intercontinental Title Ladder Match
This was brutal. I really like both of the guys involved in the match, and the match itself (isolated) was really good. However, the spots these two guys put together were completely brutal- as someone who's needed stitches not so long ago I couldn't help but wince at some of the spots these two guys put their bodies through. The spot where Harper dived onto Ziggler on the outside with the ladder, where he subsequently landed on his arm- on a ladder was horrendous; and Harper has to consider himself lucky he didn't do himself some serious damage. I'm trying not to ramble, so in short- the match itself was good (in my opinion Match of the Night), but two guys who still have (barring injury) years left on their careers killing themselves for (in the grand scheme of things) a pretty meaningless PPV in December didn't make much sense to me. As I'll also discuss later, giving us everything including the Kitchen Sink in the opening match didn't make much sense to me.
The Uso's v The Miz's: Tag Team Title Match
The finish for this was a complete cop out. The Uso's have little to no momentum aside from them randomly getting Tag Team of the Year whereas Mizdow is one of the most over guys in the company as it stands. Mizdow did his usual being amazing, everything about his gimmick works. from the Baby Slammy to not breaking Pinfalls because he's on his back as well. However, the focus on this match was more on the Uso's and Naomi- and that led to absolutely nothing because Miz ended up getting DQ'd. When I was doing my predictions I thought Naomi was still on Total Divas, so thats why I factored in a Naomi heel turn so I'm using that as my excuse for calling this match wrong.
Big Show v Erick Rowan: Steel Stairs Match
This match was flawed before either men took to the ring. both of the guys involved are decent workers- whatever you want to say about Big Shows pendulum tendencies. However, this match completely screwed them before they even had a fighting chance of putting on a good match.
John Cena v Seth Rollins: Tables Match
As soon as I saw this wasn't the Main Event I knew my prediction for this match was going to be wrong. I don't know why, and I'd like to preempt this with saying I do actually like Cena- I just don't like the way he's booked; Cena didn't look "on" in this match. Although Rollins is good fast paced worked, Cena can usually keep up- and he looked one step behind for the whole of this match. Its perhaps all of his years of being "the guy" catching up to him but he looked quite stiff in this match, and that affected the quality. I'm not going to get into the fact Cena had Rollins beaten at least three times, and then still went on to win because I've gotten to the point of beyond caring when it comes to Cenas "Super" antics. I thought the run-in would be a certain Viper, but Reigns coming back was just as effective- and perhaps for the best the Rumble is next month so Reigns won't be going over Rollins in a Singles Match until at least Elimination Chamber (or Fast Track or whatever its called now).
Nikki Bella v A.J.: Divas Title Match
Similar to Cena, this match just seemed "off". I don't know why, whether its just these two have very little chemistry, Nikki not being a very good worker, or A.J. not having her heart in it anymore but this match just seemed quite sloppy. The finish was stupid, and I'm just praying to god the spraying to the face wasn't a sign they're going to try and rip off the Beautiful People with The Bellas.
Ryback v Kane: Chairs Match
This match was marginally better than the Rowan v Show match, but I think thats more down to the stipulation, and the constraints placed on the guys involved as a consequence of the stipulation. This was still pretty "meh" though, and its not a match that you'll remember next week.
Rusev v Jack Swagger: US Title Match
If you read my predictions you'd have known I tipped this match to be really good, what I didn't expect was for them to have Rusev squash Swagger in roughly 5 minutes with Swagger getting in very little offence. Especially considering the amount of time there was left in the PPV, and what happened the PPV finished with roughly 10 Minutes still available to them.
Bray Wyatt v Dean Ambrose: TLC
By all logic the crowd should have been going insane due to the number of spots in this match, Off the top of my head Bray went through 3 Tables via an Ambrose Elbow Drop- one of them off a 25ft (allegedly) ladder. But this match was proof of one thing, Gimmick PPVs suck. The fact is (without counting- if someone has let me know) we'd already seen 4 or 5 Table Spots before we even got to the Main Event, and that burned out the crowd. We'd already seen brutal ladder spots, and that burned out the crowd. We'd already see false finish after false finish, and that burned out the crowd. In summary this match was proof of whats wrong with Modern "Sports Entertainment". Not the match itself, because I really liked it- but the circumstances surrounding the match were far from ideal. To give a comparison to the two products of NXT and WWE- NXT had the crowd on the edge of their feet for the whole of a 20+ Minute Main Event, and popped the crowd massively at the end. The Main Event of the WWE PPV ended with an exploding TV, because when you pull your TV wire out it explodes right?
I'd also like to give a brief mention to the great Superstar of the Year Roman Reigns botching a backstage promo, the Retweets were appreciated Roman.
Thanks for reading as ever, I'm back tomorrow for the RAW Review- and I'll be on Twitter for the usual shenanigans as well. I might even do the Live Smackdown if I haven't died from sleep deprivation by then. As always any feedback is appreciated, and lets just hope RAWs a good one, because I'm yawning now- and RAW won't be finished for nearly 12 hours.
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