Considered response: Fulham 1-3 Sunderland

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.