Ok, that certainly wasn't the best game of football I have ever seen, and I have no doubt that some of our "fans" will be very critical of that performance. But first and foremost almost all of the blame for the boring game should lie at the door of Fullham and Martin Jol who came here with no intent what-so-ever to score a goal; hence they only mustered a single effort of any note in the most toothless attacking display I have seen all season. But implore any fans to tell me that Fullham didn't defend brilliantly, and for me that is partly why we looked a bit mediocre in attack. No doubt people will also say that Hughton should have made subs earlier; but I also read comments criticising his choice of subs when he did! To be fair, in the way of attacking options (And we certainly didn't need defensive ones) all he had on the bench were the misfiring Simeon Jackson/Andrew Surman and Kei Kamara who has hardly trained, although he did look lively when he came on. However, on the other side of the coin, by the end of the first half it became clear that Fullham weren't interested in winning, and there was no way we needed two holding midfielders; I have to say I am a bit disappointed Hughton didn't try bringing someone on sooner. At the end of the day, we kept the ball well enough, but in the first half we didn't seem to have any attacking intent at all, (backpass, backpass, backpass) and IMO that was the wrong way to approach this game especially with the benefit of hindsight. The thing is, nobody really had a poor game for us, although I guess Snodgrass and Hoolahan were the only ones who really looked lively in attack. Maybe we missed Grant Holt, but considering what he was working with I though Becchio did a pretty good job. So really what I am saying is, yes the mindset was probably wrong today, but the reason the game was so dull was because Fullham set up to defend and did it superbly. We were the better team today, and you all know it.
It was apparent after 30 mins that left hand side today was very poor, Bennett in particular, probably the worst ive seen him play. The change at H/T should have been Bennett off, wes over to the l/hand side and either Jackson or Kamara on, my 11 year old son picked this up why cant our manager? This was two points dropped today against a very ordinary Fulham side, had to smile when the PA guy was telling the fans to remain seated even in periods of excitement, then stopped dead as if the fans standing couldn't possibly use this as an excuse !!! Bad day at work, back to the training ground!
No, we were not the better team, we were just the home team. The reason the game was dull was because we did not commit from midfield. No one broke into the penalty area when Hoolahan had the ball. The players did not play badly (apart from Bennet), it was the set up which contributed to the poor game. Fulham defended and we didn't respond, not because we couldn't, but because we chose not to.
I don't think the slap-head emoticon is appropriate, despite Fulham defending well, we didn't have a clue what to do with the ball, so I feel it's fair game to criticise the team. As said, after about half an hour it was obvious Fulham wanted the draw, and there was no need for Tettey and Johnson. We lacked creativity, so I would have liked to have seen Surman come on to help Wes out. But really, Hughton didn't change the formation at all. After 75 mins we had Bennett subbed for Jacko, which put us more towards 4-4-2, but then Kamara was playing on the left when he replaced Becchio, so really we just changed to a slightly more attacking 4-2-3-1. There was no ambition to try to go on and win the game. We were never in danger of losing, so Hughton settled for a point. If we eke out 12 bore-draws for the rest of the season, we'll reach 41 points, but with Man Utd, Arsenal and Man City away still to come, we are not going to draw 12 games. We are going to have to win games, and the wins are going to have to come against the likes of Fulham. Southampton, Reading and Villa at home are all very winnable games, but if we don't show the ambition to go and win the games, it's not going to happen, especially when the opposition are fighting for survival.
As I've said elsewhere, Hughton has set his stall out. Bore draw our way to survival. If it works great and we'll all call him a hero. If it doesn't he's toast. And he should be for being such a coward.
We didn't have any punch I just felt we were not going to break through their defence, every time a ball was drifted into Becchio you just knew Senderos and Hangeland were going to be there or when we had a shot baked bean head Sidwell would jump in the way. This sounds almost cliche but that game cried out for Holt, I actually think he would of worn them down. Some positives we defended well at least, Kamara looked ok, gained a point and it wasn't entirely gutless performance but at the same time I can't help going away from this game feeling slightly disappointed.
Why the quotes around the word fans. Is this the "MUST NOT CRITICISE" Police in action again? DM your take on the game in my opinion is so naive and unimaginative. Fulham will take an away draw all day. They do not have to supply the entertainment or the attractive style of play. The onus was on us to do that. And we made little attempt to do that. The players ability is obvious and they go out and hopefully give their best. But when their ability is stifled by the safety first tactic AT HOME, then we end up with the displays we are getting. We did show some ambition against Spurs and I even accept last weeks dire performance was acceptable because we were away from home. But as you rightly point out, Fulham had no ambition. So we should have altered our tactic at half time. But on no, out we come and unambitious Fulham don't have to alter anything they have done as we churn out the same fare. Big deal, we stay in the Prem and the only reason is because their are worse teams than us. But it should be because we are better than them.
Reminds me of the qpr game last week, who did they play again ??? You can't say that a goals draw was fulhams fault, look at the big picture hughton is a defensive manager and both teams today were negative. Did you not see how Norwich set their stall up last week at loftus road ?? And tbf they got it spot on, but don't come on her stating Fulham came to CR just to keep Norwich out like they are something like barca going forward
Fulham were the better side today, by a mile. Yes, in the first half, no-one seemed interested in winning. Then Fulham noticed this and went for it in the first 25 minutes of the second half. When they ran out of steam, then, finally we had a BIT of a go. Dimitar Berbatov was different class today, and seemed the only player capable of scoring a goal. I would say Snodgrass looked likely to score as well, had he not laid the ball off every time he got into the box. It's because of Hughton that we didn't lose, but it's also because of him that we didn't win. His infuriatingly negative tactics meant that, despite everyone playing fine, we didn't get anywhere. Why did we continue to play two holding midfielders? Why did they never get forward, unless when on the ball? And have you noticed that every player seems to have a point up to which they can run with the ball before they feel obliged to pass it to someone playing in a more forward position (hope that makes sense)? If there's no-one in front of you, run! Hughton has to start being braver. If we play in the manner we did today for the rest of the season, we will be relegated. I'm reaching the end of my tether.
That's exactly the point - I would have thought Fullham would have been looked at this fixture and thought 'we could win this, let's go for it' but instead they chose to play 2 holding midfielders to mark our one striker of a team who has score one goal in the last five or so matches!
1) What game were you watching? Fullham mustered a single effort of any note which Bunn saved comfortably. They couldn't keep a cross in play! 2) Berbatov was anonymous for me, hit a few crosses out for a goalkick, that is all. 3) If we play like that for the rest of the season we will finish with 41 point and will not be relegated.
Most away teams come to sit back and look to counter attack on the break and get all three A point ain't great but look at other results that have finished and its a point gained.
Yes, a point is probably an acceptable result for both sides, but clearly some of my fellow Norwich fans expect Fullham to turn up and roll over for us.
1) Norwich also only forced Schwarzer into one save. Fulham kept the ball much more comfortably than us, and, even though they were the away team didn't look like losing at any point. They forced us into playing on the counter-attack. 2) You obviously weren't paying enough attention. He pulled the Norwich defense apart. No-one knew whether to stay with him or drop back and hold the line. He found so much space it was scary. But, when he had the ball, we dealt with him well. 3) We will not get 12 draws from the remainder of the season playing like that. Teams with more class, such as Man. United, Arsenal and Man. City will pick us off with the amount of possession we would afford them. We must be more positive and we need a ball player in our midfield - Johnson and Tettey cannot pass well enough, as energetic as they may be.
So we didn't have Tettey and Johnson in the middle sitting in front of the back four who only had to mark Berbatov who by your rating wasn't too hot. And you say they only had one attempt at goal. So why weren't we more adventurous. One win and two defeats will get us the same points as three draws.
Posted this on the match thread, but it seems relevant to all the recent ones, so here it is again: "Just for info. the last time we beat Fulham in any competition was in March 1986, in the Second Division. Since then, including today, we have played them 12 times, twice in the then Worthington Cup, the rest in the top league (First Division or Premier League). Our record against them in those 12 games is LOST 9, DRAWN 3."
1) Well, we had 15 shots, 8 on target - alot more than Fullham, and whilst I agree that we didn't anything like attack the game enough, in the last 10 mins we went for it and IMHO we did then look like scoring. 2) Well, neither me, nor the commentators were very impressed with his performance today. I guess everyone has their opinions but he was anonymous to me. 3) No we won't get 12 draws, we would win some games against teams who didn't defend as well as Fullham and lose some against teams who attack better. Yes, we do need to be more positive, especially today when it became clear we weren't needing two holding mids of course I think we should have attacked it, I'd be absolutely ****ing deluded if I thought we'd had shown enough intent, but this thread is about balancing that out with the fact that Fullham were very stubborn today. And on your Johnson/Tettey point I don't recall Johnson missing a single ground pass all afternoon - although admittedly most of his passes were to Bassong and Turner. Agree about Tettey's passing though, been complaining about it for a few games myself.
Please, even since my OP I have not once claimed to be delighted with our approach to the game against a Fullham side who, with hindsight were absolutely mediocre. That's the message of my thread - I understand were all you guys are coming from, but I also think that a) Fullham made our attacking play look worse than it actually was with great defending and b) Once the game had started, I can understand Hughton's reluctance to made subs as Jackson/Surman haven't looked great of late and the only other attacking option, Kamara had only trained twice! We would probably have looked better with Pilkington, because Elliott Bennett doesn't look the same on the left either, and Holt too because Senderos and Hangeland wouldn't have been so comfortable against him.
I think we'll have to agree to disagree on a few things, although I'm glad we've met on certain points. The problem I have with Johnson is that he doesn't have any ambition with his passing, as you allude to. His passing fades in comparison to Fox, but I do think that he is a better player overall. The problem is that we don't need him AND Tettey. Can I also say that our play wasn't intelligent enough today? We often took two or three touches when one was necessary, and we missed potentially incisive passes in order to keep the ball. We eventually just gave it back to the defense on many of these occasions. Despite our disagreements DM, I admire your optimism. I'm just fed up with negative performances. Half the problem is that we had three years under Lambert, and his style was so different.
