This is obviously just my take on the season, so feel free to chip in your views. Numbers can only say so much, but I've tried to be fair. Schwarzer - 7.5, shot-stopping in the second half of the season was brilliant with several important penalty saves. However, we can't overlook the continuing problems with his distribution and the fact that his performances whilst still good are definitely trending downwards. I don't want him to leave, but he can't be a guaranteed starter next year. Stockdale - 4, sadly I think Stockdale's performance against Swansea spelled the end for him here. He seems to have taken lessons in distributing the ball from Schwarzer, and still doesn't command his area. Goalkeeper overview: It is impossible to overlook the fact that Schwarzer is 40 and Stockdale has not progressed as we'd like. Schwarzer has not had a bad year at all, just a bad one by his very high standards. We need to find a replacement if we can; I'd love Stekelenburg. Riise - 6, struggled against quick wingers all year. Still a competent LB at this level, but definitely declining. After the revelation of Riether, I think we may look for a new LB this summer. Senderos - 6, so frustrating to watch. Quicker and stronger than Hughes, but prone to terrible errors. Exposed somewhat by Riether's tendency to get forward once Dejagah's injury took away any of our threat on the right. Good back up hopefully, once a new CB arrives. Hangeland - 7.5, exposed by our lack of a midfield early in the year, Brede seemed back to himself after signing his new deal. Seems to drive forward more than previously. Not a great captain, but a great player for us. Glad he's staying. Baird - 5, horribly overexposed in CM for several months. Solid player but not what we needed. Deserves credit for trying his hardest, but not much more than a role player at this stage. Briggs - 4, I really want Briggs to succeed, but I didn't see anything from him this year that made me think he has a future at this level. Hughes - 6, I think we saw the beginning of the end of Hughes' career this year. Played well when he came in, but no better than Senderos and not the same player we've seen previously. Manolev - 6, didn't play enough for a fair assessment. He looked great against Arsenal, stepping in for Riether, but looked off the pace against Newcastle. Hard to grade. Riether - 9, defensively sound and frequently seemed to play the whole right side (RB, RM & RW) by himself. Consistent and dependable, with a good cross and an impressive engine. There are not many better right backs in the Premier League. Richardson - 5, deserves higher based on his performances, but we can't ignore his injury issues. Scored a cracker against Blackpool and added some needed pace at left back, but he missed so much time. Nice to have some English players in the squad though. Defence overview: Riether and Hangeland are great, but aging. We need to find a new CB/LB now while the other half of our defence is still top quality. Frequently we were exposed at the back this year, but that was as much due to a lack of any cover from the midfield in front of them. Sidwell - 6, deserves higher based on performance, but can't ignore his 7 games suspended when we already knew our CM weakness. Needs to be careful now, having gained a bad reputation. Strong engine, but suffered from trying to be the Dembele-type that we needed and he isn't. Kasami - N/A, he either needs a chance next year, or we need to sell. Frimpong - 6.5, good role player, adding strength to our midfield. His impact against QPR secured three points and he played his part brilliantly. I doubt we sign him though, as Jol doesn't seem to see him as a complete player. Karagounis - 7.5, Kara saved our season. Once he gained match fitness, he became our CM general and helped right the ship. Sadly at 36, he's not a long-term fix. Love him as a player, but we need to find the next Kara, not the old one. Duff - 6, started the season well, but age seems to be catching up. Faded out of games and didn't add much threat on the right. A competent back up next year, his starting days are over. Diarra - 3, we saved his career and he repays us by reversing his international retirement and ending his career again. We should offer him the chance to stay (ala Grygera), but should not be considered a starter again. Frei - 5, didn't make the most of his chances, but then wasn't really given good chances. Still very young, he should continue to get better. Dejagah - 7.5, frustrating at the start of the year, but grew as the season went on. We missed him when he went for surgery, he should be a starter ahead of Duff next year. Kacaniklic - 6.5, flashes of brilliance, but too often marked out of games. The future is bright for Kaca (and his partnership with Berbatov was great) and we should see more of him next year. Emanuelson - 6, his role as cover for 4 positions didn't let him settle. Woeful against QPR, never seemed to find his feet. Looked great in patches, but too often seemed out of his depth. Davies - N/A, sadly his time here seems to be done. One of my favourite players of the last decade, his fitness & age combine to spell the end for Digger. Enoh - 6.5, stepped in for Sidwell when the suspensions hit and performed the "terrier" role. Not much attacking ability, but a good partner for a skilled passer. Midfield overview: Our play down the wings was sublime at times, and much better than we've seen in recent seasons. Unfortunately the loss of Murphy and Dembele was not addressed and we were lacking in the middle. We had steel but no creativity and we just could not retain the ball. We have to find some central midfielders who are comfortable on the ball, as we can't link up our attacking players without that central pivot. In hindsight, Charlie Adam may not have been a bad signing for us. I would love to see Huddlestone or Carrick here, but neither is realistic. I expect Jol to look to the Bundesliga or Eredivisie to try and find our Dembele/Murphy replacement. Berbatov - 7.5, when we played well, it was through Berbatov. When we didn't, he didn't see the ball. Doesn't seem to click with some players, but can be sublime. His goals were crucial and I saw enough to think that if we can sort our CM, Berbatov can be the pivot for a much better year next season. I did get tired of his attitude from time to time. Not getting to 15 league goals impacts his rating. Petric - 5, started well but his injuries wrecked his season and likely ended his spell here. Never seemed to regain match fitness. Ruiz - 6.5, the hardest grade. Going forward he is so good and very creative. Often created something from nothing. He slows play down too much and frequently drops too deep, but that could be partially attributed to the lack of a Dembele (or any attacking CM) to help him. Only graded so low as I fully believe he can be a more complete player and is not being the player he truly can be. Rodallega - 6, bless him, he tries. I like Hugo for his effort, but he just isn't the most talented guy. Hard to see how he offers any more than Tankovic would do. Forwards overview: We lack a traditional striker, but the way we play does not emphasise strikers particularly anyway. Frequently Ruiz dropped deep into the midfield to cover the lack of spark there, and left us playing with one up front. Jol needs to define a role for Ruiz that harnesses his attacking quality. I've certainly seen enough this year to think that in front of a stable midfield, Ruiz and Berbatov can slice open most defences in the league. However, I'd like to see a strong/quick striker come in to enable us to mix up how we play. Petric and Hugo are not good enough to be playing ahead of our talented youngsters. Coaching: Jol has spent the whole year trying to cover up the fact we lost Dembele without having the cash to do so. Jol has made great use of the loan system, but there is no substitute for a player playing hard for the club to which he is actually contracted. Jol's substitutions have been maddeningly slow at times, but I appreciate towards the end of the year he was trying different things. I think Jol is absolutely the right man for the job and I'm confident that given the right backing he can address those few key issues which are holding us back. It's been a frustrating season, especially our cup performances. We've played some great football and some dire rubbish, but I have no doubts that Jol can see the problem areas as well as we can. 12th is a fair reflection of the season we've had, but I'd much rather be frustrated than hopeless; there is plenty of potential in this squad. It'll be an interesting summer for us, which will define how I feel when August rolls around. COYW!
A very good post indeed surly, hard to disagree with any of that, although I'd maybe mark Berbatov up to an 8.
I knocked him down to a 7.5 as I mistakenly thought he only got 14 league goals. That 15th goal (against Swansea) would have led to an 8. I chose not to amend my post, as it would have made your post quite confusing Bandy.
One goal gets you an extra 0.5 points? Generous scoring indeed surly I was rather surprised (or perhaps not) to read Jamie Redknapp's season review for us, he gave Berbatov basically all of the accolades, Best Player, Best Signing, Best Goal etc, whereas Riether was stuck with the Best Breakthrough, despite the fact he's 30. Strange indeed.
It's more because of the landmark nature of 15 goals in relation to a lead striker in the Premier League; the logic was that failing to hit that level costs you 0.5 points, rather than the other way around. As I said, the numbers can be somewhat arbitrary when analysing the performance of so many different players across different positions! I'm not surprised by Redknapp. Like many pundits, I doubt he saw many Fulham games; the fact Riether was not even mentioned in regards to the Premier League XI underlines this. Berbatov is our marquee player (quite rightly) and he's going to get the attention from pundits who don't know much about the club. Given the importance of goals, Berbatov was our best player and best signing. Best goal belongs to Karagounis/Richardson (best league goal probably belongs to Ruiz). Anyways, the reviews from the mainstream media was exactly what motivated me to write my own review!
Surlyc Concur with your general assesment. re :the Tank, Grimmer, & also Woodrow, should next season go out on loan, Dan Burn recalled back to becoming a squad member, For us to become a mid, to upper half team,with those you rated with a six, upping their game or being replaced. The 13/14 season, hopefully will be one where we are not on a white knuckle ride comes next March.
Great post Surlyc !!!!!! I can hardly disagree with anything. (I'll not go on yet again about our midfield exposing our defence).
Nice analysis. I can't disagree, though I think 9 for Rieter is high. Dejagah was fun to watch. Riise and Duff, true professionals, stood out for me, along with Berbatov's genius. But I think we'll look back at this year as a "lost" year for Fulham. We stayed up, but barely.
I agree with DR. This is the first season since our great escape that I have felt we haven't moved forward at all and in fact I felt we went backwards quite a bit. It wouldn't surprise me to see pundits tipping us for the drop come the previews of next season, especially if they aren't that impressed with our summer business, whatever that may be. That would be harsh, but I can see it happening given they know roughly the square root of **** all about most of our players.
I think the pundits have tipped us for the drop the past two seasons, I definitely remember Robbie Savage saying that. I agree it's not been a particularly good season, but as I've said hundreds of times before, what did we expect? It was always going to be transitional with Demps, Dembele and Murphy going. We started excellently, don't forget. So yeah, I'm not happy about it but I'm not surprised either.
You are quite right. Savage did tip us to go down but then we are talking Robbie Savage, so I guess anything is possible.
Great post Surly ol bean. I would say that Mark Schwarzer kept us in more games than I care to think about. The stop at Spurs against Defoe was the save of the season. Reither was superb all year. You have to be good to be that consistent, but it could be the old first season try hard, get my contract and sit back syndrome! Hope not. For me we started well but when we lost Diarra we slid back, probably coincidence. I love Berbatov but I wonder what effect he has on other players who are clearly not as talented as him. Although I was probably marginally better than him in my pomp I think I'd still be intimidated by him. Injuries came at a crucial time and we lost a lot of momentum. All in all a not bad season with flashes of brilliance but also a lot of tripe.
Wonderful post Surly - absolutely spot on. So far as games go, while I will always support Fulham my enthusiasm for the team this season waned after that turgid, inept performance at Loftus Road. Two games stand out for me though. The first could illustrate our whole season’s performance in one game and that was the 3-3 draw away to Arsenal. Epitomised, ironically, by Richardson having to be replaced injured after only 12 minutes, then some great attacking play, some awful defending and a last minute penalty save by Schwarzer. With the away fans out-singing the home lot throughout it was an exceptional day and it was definitely the best match I’ve seen all season. In the second we had a whole season’s bad luck rolled into one game and that was the home game against Sunderland. What it means to support ’little old Fulham’ was brought home when virtually the whole crowd stayed at the end to show their appreciation despite a 3-1 defeat. Regrettably, as everyone including Jol says, this was to be a pivotal match in our season - losing 3 keys players for a period following it. However the team, and Jol, did us proud that night.
Sunderland was the one home game I missed all year, as I was away in the States. I promise not to go on holiday during next season.
Yes, how dare you put personal pleasure (or business come to that) before the mighty Whites. Please plan your life (personal or business) better next season otherwise words will need to be had.
