Fulham 2 City 1
Post Match Analysis by Kate Thompson
I met several gloom and doom merchants after the game against Fulham, but I think it is far too early to throw the towel in. There were several newish faces and it will take time to get them to gel as a team. Sadly, the improvement we saw in the second half against Spurs was not in evidence against Fulham but it was nothing like as bad as when we last played them at Craven Cottage!
Like many fans, I would like to see Pereira start and don’t understand why a place cannot be found for him. I am yet to be convinced about De Cordova Reid but I hope he wins me over sooner rather than later. Some players who were impressive against Spurs – notably Buonanotte – failed to continue that form, which was disappointing. I think Skipp will develop into a good ball-playing midfielder once he gets bedded down but I need convincing that Ayew was a good buy. I would love to be proved wrong.
What was most concerning was the number of misplaced passes, including by the normally immaculate Winks; one silly backheel from Faes nearly gifted Fulham a second goal before they did score again. The other player who is nothing like the one he was in the past was Ndidi, who lost the ball far too often. Justin was criticised by pundits but he was left high and dry on occasions even though he worked his socks off.
Midway through the second half, when the score was still 1-1 there were some puzzling chants about Jon Rudkin, including some rather unpleasant ones. He is one of a team and I don’t believe should be singled out for a collective failure. I hope he has a thick skin! When Ayew came on, some of the fans near me were ecstatically singing his name before he had touched the ball! He managed to sky a free kick in a good position on the edge of the box – I wondered why he took it.
I have just read that when Cooper was the manager of Forest, they only won two away matches and relied on their home form to keep them up. Let’s hope we can improve on that! Last season City fans enjoyed their days out – with one or two notable exceptions – but this season we must be more realistic. The elephant in the room, of course, is how many points we will be docked and the sooner that is settled the better.
CITY (4-2-3-1): Mads Hermansen; James Justin, Wout Faes, Jannik Vestergaard, Victor Kristiansen (Kasey McAteer 85); Wilfred Ndidi, Harry Winks: Abdul Fatawu, Facundo Buonanotte (Oliver Skipp 71), Bobby De Cordova-Reid (Jordan Ayew, 63); Jamie Vardy (Stephy Mavididi 71). Subs not used: Danny Ward, Caleb Okoli, Hamza Choudhury, Ricardo Pereira, Boubakary Soumare.
FULHAM (4-2-3-1): Bernd Leno; Kenny Tete, Calvin Bassey, Issa Diop, Antonee Robinson; Sasa Lukic, Andreas Pereira (Harrison Reed 86), Alex Iwobi, Emile Smith Rowe (Harry Wilson 69), Adama Traore (Tom Cairney 69); Rodrigo Muniz (Raul Jimenez 80). Subs not used: Jorge Cuenca, Timothy Castagne, Steven Benda, Jay Stansfield, Ryan Sessegnon
The views expressed in this report are the opinions of the Trust member nominated to file the report only and do not represent the views of the Foxes Trust organisation