Having perfected my thousand yard stare all through Bishop’s Park, I spent half an hour staring into space when I got home. Thelonious Monk, a dark room, and a glass of Hady’s home-made sloe gin made things a bit better. An Indian takeaway helped even more.
What a day though. I caught myself thinking about next week’s game a moment ago. “If we beat Reading it’s back on…”
Nuts! That’s the awful thing. Football doesn’t do what you want it to. I’ve had a numbr of conversations about how maybe next year will be more fun. Well maybe.
Match of the Day was not forgiving. Our first concession was very similar, too similar, to the equaliser at Derby. Why are all the goals we concede coming from the left all of a sudden? Why can’t we defend our six yard box?
The second was a horror, as Hangeland got comprehensively outjumped by Jones, and Hughes just lost the ball in flight. Chopra’s volley went in as much through luck as judgement.
The third was the product of chasing the game, but again Hangeland was in view. He made at least three errors in this goal and eventually Jones put the chance away.
We’ve had so many chances to get out of this mess. A win at Derby and a win today and we’d be a point behind Birmingham with them due to visit us at the Cottage. Those results should have been achievable, they really should.
Here.
Our Roy looks pretty devastated.
Their Roy says that his team was pretty bad but scored at the right times.
Expect to see Healy again then next week. I haven’t got the means to check, but has he had more than a couple of games in the side since the start of the season?
Well that’s it. Comfortably beaten by a team containing a number of players I’ve never heard of. Nothing going forwards, nothing at the back, very little in the middle. We’re going down and deserve to go down.
Sunderland had an early header disallowed, a let-off we didn’t take advantage of. They scored, officially this time, right on the stroke of half-time. It changed the game from one that was chugging along underwhelmingly to one that was about to get out of control. In the second half Sunderland, shockingly, added another. This time the fizzy little Chopra scored, shinning the ball over Kasey Keller with a weird volley when allowed through by more non-existent defending.
David Healy had an aesthetic outburst and bent a beautiful, magical strike into the corner of the Hammy End net. Left footed too. It woke the crowd up briefly, but Sunderland quickly reestablished their two goal lead, Kenwyne Jones the happy recipient of all the time and space he could have wanted. He buried his shot past Keller and the season was off again.
This was no time to be angry. Quiet resignation swept across the crowd and many decided to leave there and then. Had they stayed they’d have seen David Healy nearly score again, this time with a planted header that went wide. It was a reminder that, for all his faults, the man does have a nice ability to get into goalscoring positions, as does his fellow sub, the red-booted Clint Dempsey, who also came close late on.
This Fulham team does not reward optimism. We could have won today and been right back amongst the other strugglers. We would have had the chance to beat Reading and Birmingham, and really scrapped for survival. But it’s not there is it? The team is dying before our eyes, lacking belief and quality. It’s a damning and unworkable combination.
“I’m dead, right?”
“No, you’re in New Jersey”
Ideal day for football here in South London. It’s a bit chilly, a bit of a breeze, but as yet nothing too heavy.
I’m strangely optimistic. Craven Cottage seems to be a hard place for teams to visit again. Yeah, we lost to West Ham at home, but that wasn’t reasonable, was it?
Sunderland are confident and in some form, and I guess the game will be tight, but we can do this. Operation Salvage requires a win. We’re not dead yet.
