Well, that was a pretty standard win overall. Whatever long-term issues there is with Kit Symons- on days like today we can put them to one side. The First-Half was truly great, and the thing is we weren't even ridiculously dominant/on-top- we showed another different side to us in that we were ridiculously clinical today. Between a combination of pressure we put Bristol City under in the First-Half and really pressure they put on themselves- the First-Half was just magical. We did let-up and sat back somewhat in the 2nd Half and we were practically inviting Bristol City to score at times, so the fact we didn't keep the Clean Sheet is a shame- but not really a surprise.
Right then, let's relive it all in great (not really great detail)- starting with the Goals. I should actually say I don't know the exact times of the goals because Bristol City didn't have a scoreboard (I mean really, how does a Championship team in 2015 not have a Scoreboard?!). What I do know for definite is Moussa Dembele is a special player. Husband if you're including winning the Free-Kick got three assists today- and his first one was by far his best. It was great work from Husband to work it through to Dembele and in the form he's in- he simply wasn't missing. I honestly thought we'd blown it for the Second Goal. When we got the break with the ball falling to Tunnicliffe and he laid it off to Cairney with him cutting inside I thought he was going to shoot or any pass he attempted would be intercepted. So when Cairney found Dembele with the pass he did it was a (very) pleasant surprise for Dembele to be found- and as already said, on the form he's on he simply wasn't missing. The Third and Fourth Goals were just "once in a blue moon" type occurrences. It may be because Bristol City were just laughably bad at times in the First Half- or because everything was seemingly "clicking" for us going forward, but I genuinely thought McCormack would score the Free-Kick. The angle for the Free-Kick was perfect, and it was just up to McCormack to actually follow through on it- and he did! Let me just type this out to comprehend it, because I'm running on about 2 Hours Sleep and I've been meeting with a load of relatives. Ryan Tunnicliffe, RYAN TUNNICLIFFE was put through on goal by James Husband and LOBBED the Goalkeeper SUCCESSFULLY and SCORED. Yup. It truly was our day. The Kodjia goal was unfortunate for us, but any realistic Fulham Fan would say the goal was coming. In the 2nd Half we were basically in 1st Gear the whole time, that in turn lead to quite a few mistakes and on another day Kodjia would have rounded Lonergan and just shot and scored a lot earlier than he did.
Speaking of Andy Lonergan, he has a right to be annoyed with the defence when it comes to the Bristol City goal and him losing the Clean Sheet- because by the time they did score we'd completely switched off. On the whole though I thought Lonergan did well, I won't say "good" because despite a few scares I wouldn't say he was properly tested at any point today- and definitely not tested consistently.
The Defence was really weird today, I think we ended up playing about 7 Defenders in the game by the time the Full-Time whistle went. It really is hard to make too much of a judgement on certain players today because Bristol City were generally dire. With that said, you can "only beat what you're up against"- and with that in mind I do have to say Dan Burn did well today. I think the point I've made throughout when it comes to Dan Burn is (through no fault of his own) he's been playing against almost exclusively Strikers who I wouldn't say are Championship quality. See Matt Derbyshire, Marc Antoine-Fortune, That 18 Year Old Blackpool had- and while he has somewhat dispelled that with the Clean Sheet against Boro (although I can't speak for his performance in that game) I think Aaron Wilbraham definitely falls into the prior category. I thought Stearman did pretty well as well today, Stearman and Ream were wearing multiple hats today, with Husband and Fredericks going off it wasn't exactly a settled back line- but for the most part it worked.
As with Stearman, Ream was wearing multiple hats today- but on the whole he coped fine at Left and Centre-Back. I'm not reading too much into it, and Burnley will definitely be a bigger test of us should Kit try and keep as many players who started the game today in the team as possible. Ryan Fredericks was of course coming up against his (very brief) former club today- and on the whole he did really well. I'm hoping he went off in a tactical change as opposed to an enforced one, I haven't looked at much with regard to Post-Match stuff at this moment in time.
The Midfield was quite weird today in all honesty, I was fully prepared to absolutely crucify Kit after he started with Husband at Left-Mid with Ream at Left-Back, but it definitely worked. Husband was absolutely quality going forward today, but that isn't exactly surprising news knowing what we all know. I know Husband went off with a knock, but hopefully it is just that- a knock as opposed to something too bad. I thought Ryan Tunnicliffe did really well today, he of course scored the goal- but then especially First-Half when we were putting the screws to Bristol City and forcing mistakes out of them he was crucial in doing so in the Midfield. I'm honestly not sure what to make of Jamie O'Hara's performance today. I'm in no way saying he played "badly" today, but at the same time I thought he was pretty shaky at times today and (not exclusive to him) he gave the ball away too much at times. Tom Cairney is just a special player really, looking back it may be underwhelming- but at the time I thought the vision from Cairney for the Dembele goal was great, and he just generally played really well going forward.
Right then, we're breaking new ground here- Moussa Dembele is great. I think I may be unique in that opinion- but I'm just going to throw it out there. Dembele is simply just a great Striker- and it's seriously amazing how much he's developed in such a short amount of time. Two or Three Months ago Dembele would have missed the two chances he took today, that isn't an opinion- you just had to be there for the Sheffield Utd game. Dembele really should have had a Hat-Trick today, I was a bit disappointed he came off today in all honesty- especially because it looked like McCormack had a bit of a knock. I wanted him to finally turn his "two goal games" into a Hat-Trick which was there for the taking today- but I won't be complaining too much. McCormack took his Free-Kick today and put it away to perfection- but apart from that he was quite frustrating in my opinion. This was almost perfectly evidenced in the Second Half when he cut inside and then attempted to take on all of the Defenders before actually attempting a shot and had he have just shot we may well have scored 5.
The Subs Kit made were "interesting", but with consolidation being the main priority in the 2nd Half I'm not complaining too much. I'm not sure if the Fredericks Sub was enforced, but either way Christensen came on and was generally fine. I'm not sure I'm comfortable with Stearman playing Right-Back based on today, but I'm definitely not going to focus on the negatives today. Bringing Matt Smith on was good, it gave him an ovation he deserved from the Bristol City fans and from a Fulham perspective it was definitely good to see Smith back on the pitch. As I've already said, I'd have preferred he came on for McCormack- but it's splitting hairs in the grand scheme of things. It was funny with Garbutt coming on, because it looked like we were about to bring on Kacaniklic before he went down and we had to quickly re-shuffle. Either way Garbutt came on and was generally fine, The last few minutes were sort of a blur to be honest- but the goal definitely came from his side although I'm not sure if he could have done any better from it. One for the highlights.
It's hard to read too much into this game, Bristol City at times didn't actually look like they knew what defending was- so while the win and the atmosphere and everything was great it's hard to say whether it'll turn into any long-term success. With that said, we've scored 8 Goals and conceded just 1 since that Orlando Sa goal went in- and some of the goals we scored today were just absolutely sublime.
Thanks for reading as always, we've got a quick turnaround at present- and the Burnley Preview will be going up on Monday so hopefully you'll stay tuned for that one. I stand by my statement that I think the Burnley game is a write-off even after the result today, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Thanks again for reading, have a Happy Halloween- it's times like when you're currently stuck on a Motorway, running on 2 Hours Sleep and just generally exhausted when you realise just how much Football means to you and just how great it really is.
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