And so to Craven Cottage, the throw-back Thames-side home of our hosts for Saturday’s ultimate Premier League game of the day.
Fulham will have resided there for 130 years come next year — and the ground came close to being our home, too, in the 1910s. There is a bare-bones version of the story on the club site. Still, the full tale of the grand ambition, mischievous intrigues and general skullduggery then afoot will make for a story here for another interminable interlull.
Craven Cottage is the oldest continually operating football club stadium in London. With Everton having vacated Goodson Park, it is now also the second-oldest in the Premier League after Molineux.
The old-school, timbered cosiness of the stadium, designed by Highbury’s architect, Archibald Leitch, is slowly giving way to modernism. The old Riverside Stand has been redeveloped into a deluxe steel-and-glass edifice that overlooks the river on one side and the pitch on the other, with abundant hospitality opportunities in between. Yet the 30,000-seat ground retains sufficient charm and intimacy to remain a favourite of travelling faithfuls and, to others, becomes a refuge from high prices (not any more in the Riverside stand – tickets are £160 a seat for this match, Ed.) and ticket ballots elsewhere.
The opposition
With a sprinkling of our old boys and the appointment of Marco Silva as manager in mid-2021, Fulham has established itself as a mid-table Premier League club after a spell oscillating between the top tier and the Championship. Silva is enjoying his longest and most successful spell in management since being at Olympiacos a decade ago, whence he trudged an unglamorous path to SW6 via Hull, Watford and Everton.
He favours 4-2-3-1, although he went with 3-4-2-1 at Bournemouth immediately before the interlull, a formation he had not used since visiting the Emirates last season. As those games resulted in 3-1 and 2-1 defeats, a return to familiar form seems likely, especially as it secured the 1-1 draw against us at the Cottage last season.
Bernd Leno, formerly of this parish, should be between the sticks. The German glove-butler’s 126th appearance for Fulham would take him to one more than he made for us.
Denmark international Joachim Andersen, buoyed by scoring his first international goal in 47 appearances on Sunday, will be at the heart of the defence alongside Nigeria international Calvin Bassey. However, first-choice right back, Netherlands international Kenny Tete, is probably off games, and the indefatigable Milton Keynes-born US international left back Antonee Robinson definitely is.
Ryan Sessegnon, who lost the distinction of being the youngest scorer for England’s U-19s to our very own Max Dowman this week, and Belgium international Timothy Castagne will probably flank Andersen and Bassey. Silva can also call on utility defenders Spaniard Jorge Cuenca, formerly of Villarreal, for the left side, and French-Moroccan ex-West Ham man Issa Diop for the other, either as substitutes or should he decide to go with a back three after all and play Sessegnon and Castagne as wing-backs.
All mostly in their late 20s and well-established in their national teams, Fulham’s defenders make for an experienced, battle-hardened Premier League unit that tends to raise its game against top sides and has yet to lose this season at home.
Another PL stalwart, Norwegian international Sander Berge, will provide one half of the defensive midfield pivot. His partner, Serbian international Sasa Lukic, is struggling with a muscle injury that will likely rule him out of the game, opening the door for a first league start this season for club captain Tom Cairney.
In front of them, Silva has ESR and Alex Iwobi, neither of whom needs any introduction. Promising 18-year-old attacking midfielder Josh King is having a breakthrough season and has just made his England U-21 debut. Wales winger Harry Wilson and Adama Traoré, who has yet to start a game this season, offer guile and power, respectively.
Two other wingers arrived in the summer and are being worked into the team. One is Kevin, a 22-year-old Brazilian bought from Shakhtar Donetsk for €40 million — a rich price for an uncapped forward, although competition for places in Brazil’s attack is fierce. Just ask Gabi Martinelli. The other is AC Milan loanee Samuel Chukwueze, who, like compatriot Bassey, has some 50 Nigeria caps, but, Silva says, is an injury doubt.
Silva has more injury problems up front. Senior strikers Rodrigo Muniz and Raul Jimenez are ruled out and less than 50/50, respectively, the latter having pulled out of the Mexico squad this interlull past. King was pressed into service for the Bournemouth game. Silva’s other option is another 18-year-old, Jonah Kusi-Asare. The Sweden U-21 striker, on loan from Bayern Munich, has six minutes of Bundesliga experience and made Fulham’s bench for the first time for the Bournemouth game.
The Cottagers go into this game 14th in the league, with two wins, two draws and three losses from its seven league games, two of the losses coming in its two most recent games, at Villa Park and the Vitality Stadium. It has scored eight goals and conceded eleven. Neither prolific nor porous, its eight points leave it equidistant from the European places and the relegation zone.
The Arsenal
The injury list has shrunk with Piero Hincapié now available, but Jesùs, Martin Ødegaard, Kai Havertz and Noni Madueke remain off games.
Almost every fit player was on international duty, as were many of Fulham’s, as Bath chronicled in the previous drinks. All ours seem to have returned unscathed, but Arteta will be assessing until the last possible moment how much the travel and minutes played have drained them.
Both big and medium-sized Gabi travelled to Seoul and Tokyo for Brazil’s friendlies, for example, and Declan Rice played two games for England with a sore back and did not last past 70 minutes in either. Reading the runes of Arteta’s pre-match press conference — always a fool’s errand — I posit this XI to start:
Raya
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Calafiori
Zubimendi, Merino
Saka, Eze, Trossard
Gyökeres
I expect plenty of early rotation and a cameo debut for Hincapié. Arteta will need all his squad to be tan, rested and ready for the sterner test of Atletico Madrid in the Champions League next Tuesday.
Fingers and thumbs
This will be the 66th competitive meeting with Fulham, the 65th if you don’t count (remarkably) the solitary cup tie—an FA Cup first-round match in 1904 that Woolwich won 1-0 on a waterlogged Manor Ground. You can count the games we have lost since on the digits of two hands with a thumb to spare. Use that to count the number of times Silva has beaten Arteta in six attempts, although he did beat Arsenal with his Olympiacos, Watford and Everton teams.
Yet, last December, we suffered a draw at Craven Cottage, in a game ably described by C100 that we should have won. It was doubly infuriating because VAR chalked off what would have been a last-minute Saka winner. We did not know it that day, but it would be the first of three draws in a month against mid-table teams that would prove costly at the end of the campaign.
The previous season, we had lost 2-1 at Craven Cottage during a mid-season mini-slump that cost us another six points, triple the final gap between ourselves and Manchester City. 21CG reported the details of an insipid performance. It was the sole defeat in 18 away games against other London sides since the start of the 2022-23 season.
We cannot allow either outcome to repeat.
At the time of writing, we sit atop the league after seven games. By kick-off late Saturday afternoon, Bournemouth and Man City could have dislodged us. Liverpool and the neighbours play on Sunday. Three points will keep them all below the salt.
I doubt it will be a high-scoring game and Fulham are resilient at home, but a stroll by the Thames to a routine 2-0 win for the Arsenal would be the thing, with Gyökeres scoring. His record against Fulham is played two, won two, scored three.
Enjoy the game, ‘holics, near and far,
Ned,
Thanks for another excellent preview . This is a game I’ve attended on many occasions , the last time with Bath and Btm before the massive price hikes that Fulham are making. On that occasion we strolled to a 3-0 victory and on my visit before that at the zenith of the Emery era we thrashed them 5-1 .
Given their injuries we should be too strong for them but it won’t be easy. I anticipate a 3-1 win
Cheers Ned. I’ll have me some of that routine 2-0 cake.
Thanks Ned,
It’s been a while since we handed out a spanking so I’m thinking 4-0 will do nicely.
UTA
Cheers, Ned and molto grazie for your excellent preview. Three points please to go with that stroll.
Thanks Ned for a very enjoyable and informative preview. They have quite a few good players and lately play well against us. Marco Silva sets up his teams to try to play positively, which should be good for us if we move the ball fast, and our transitions are rapid and efficient.
Your team looks a very likely one. However, I would rather have Zubimendi stay on the bench for this one — and be fully fit and ready for the tough test of Atletico, especially given his familiarity with the Spanish side — with Rice and Merino starting. Martinelli, returning from his travels in Eastern Asia, hopefully won’t need to come off the bench, and we would see Nwaneri helping to see out the game.
Most of all, would like to see Gyökeres end his dry patch with club and country and score a goal or two. He has been playing well for us — much better than sometimes given credit for — and it would be great to see him back to some goalscoring rhythm.
2-0 sounds perfect! A bigger margin would be more enjoyable, obviously, but I think if we get the early lead we would try to see out this match without much fuss. Maybe Dowman for a brief cameo with his first senior goal for us?
Come on Arsenal!
A most enjoyable and informative preview, Ned. Your team looks about right and should be able to bring home the bacon, whilst a scoreline of 2-0 to the Arsenal would be a very satisfactory outcome at a venue where we have failed to deliver a win in the past two visits. I attended the last three Arsenal visits to the Cottage, the first, courtesy of TTG, in which, as he notes above, we swept Fulham aside with a masterclass from Martinelli, the second in which we took an early lead (again through Martinelli, I think) but conspired to lose all drive and direction and ended up deservedly losing 1-2 and last season which we should have won (and thought that we had with Saka’s late goal that was ultimately chalked off) but failed to administer the killer blow.
Fulham are milking fans shamelessly with their pricing and may be struggling to pay off the Riverside Stand. The prices for seats in that stand are ridiculous. I read last week that Fulham have changed their pricing for away fans too. For some years, Fulham have apparently had a neutral zone in the stand beside the away fans’ seating that is designed to hoover up tourists wanting to watch a Premiership game during a trip to London but for games like the Arsenal visit these seats have previously been included in the allocation to Arsenal fans at the same capped price as the official away seating. This season those ‘neutral’ seats have still been offered to Arsenal fans but no longer at the capped price.
Meanwhile, I must confess that your tan, rested and ready allusion went completely over my head.
Superb preview, as usual, Ned.
Personally I favour a fair bit of rotation today, with the very tough match against Simeone’s side on Tuesday coming up. I’d have White and MLS as full-backs, giving Calafiori and Timber some respite ahead of the next game. I’d also start Nwaneri for Odegaard and Eze on the left/wide left. We can bring in Martinelli, Dowman/ Trossard to run at tired second choice full backs later in the game. Hoping for a goal or two for Gyokeres to give him a boost too. COYG.
Thanks Ned – usual excellent standard upheld even if, to this reader, it made the opposition sound more formidable than their form would suggest 🤞🏻
A stroll by the river ? We should be able to bank on a win with our current squad.
Come on you Rreeddssss !
Yes, by the way, you Rreeddssss – no more of that purple and mint nonsense, thank you !
Thanks, all.
CER@&: I take your point on rotation, but my two cents is that eliminating unnecessarily dropped points is one of the ‘fine margin’ improvements Arteta is looking to make this season, so wining the next game is the priority. I also suspect his plan to lighten the workload of key players is by reducing how many minutes they play in games, rather than by reducing how many games they play, getting them off early so they play fewer of the fatigued and injury risking minutes late in games.
Trev@8: Awash with puns, as ever. Surely Bassey was puntastic in the previous drinks, too.
As for making oppositions sound formidable, most PL clubs can field a raft of internationals. It underlines how strong the league is — and how good we must be to be at the top of it.
Thanks Ned, an excellent preview as ever. The team today will I guess give us some
clues for Tuesday, certainly if Rice is rested. Looks a reasonable XI to me but we’ll see.
I feel we are just finding a bit of form now and hope for a good win, 3-0 would be great.
Ned@10- point taken.
Ange out at Forest. Two sackings and a European trophy in five months is very Ange-y!
Marinakis is reportedly looking at bringing in Silva, who worked for him at Olympiacos and is out of contract at Fulham at the end of the season. A distraction for the afternoon, hopefully.
CER@12; Noted. 😉
Cheers Ned, a tip-top preview as always. The last 2 visits to the cottage by the Thames have been disappointing results. I expect a normal strong Xl to start – Ned’s team or very close. I also agree with Nec that Mikel is substituting players much earlier than his normal 70 + minutes, this reducing the stresses on the body endured in the latter stages of matches. With the amount of injuries last year players were continuing to play on even though they were in the red zone as there were no ideal subs to come on in their place. This in turn eventual adding to the injury list. With the squad strengthening this summer we can now bring on players of the same standard.
We appear to have the bit between our teeth now and we should be coming away with all 3 points. My first away visit to Craven Cottage was in 1962 where we enjoyed a 3-1 win – the same score will do very nicely.
COYRRR
Apparently, Silva has a high release clause, which may deter Marinakis, as he has had to pay off Nuno and now Ange. Sean Dyche is the bookies’ frontrunner for the job.
Ned spot on other than Rice for Merino.
Raya
Timber, Saliba, Gabriel, Calafiori
Rice, Eze, Zubimendi
Saka, Trossard
Gyokeres.
Bench: Kepa, Lewis-Skelly, Mosquera, White, Norgaard, Nwaneri, Merino, Dowman, Martinelli.
CER@17: 👍
COYG !!!!!
Time to put a marker down.
A curious start.
We look like a team which has had 19 players away for the last fortnight.
Oh.
Absolute cracker from Cala but can’t argue with the offside decision.
No yellow card for Jimenez kicking the ball away. An Arsenal-only offence.
Good effort from Gyokeres
And then from Cala.
Always, always have Italians in your team.
Biased? Moi?
Bullshit stoppage for a tap on the nut.
Stokecastle-style timewasting.
And now a ball in the face is sufficient for the full-on dying swan. Jesus, when that happened at school our PE teachers would beast us if we dared to go down. Embrrassing.
I was rather hoping for something more than this. Still 55 minutes to go so all to play for.
Gotta tell you folks I’m a bit worried.
C100 @31 – nah. We’ll up the game this half.
Time to stroll a bit faster.
Typical first game after interlull so far complicated by clever Fulham defending.
That’s 4 or 5 Sessegnon has committed on Saka. I suppose nowhere near the threshold required for the mental midget that is Antony Taylor to take action.
Ned @33 – heh!
Snort her one laying on the ground, near death. FFS Taylor get a grip.
Have that Taylor you talent vacuum
Leooooo!
Bloke has a bad shoulder so can’t walk to the touch line. Well done, Taylor, for showing how you’re really in charge.
One nil to The Arsenal!
He takes Saka at the knee before he makes contact with the ball. Fucking ridiculous.
Strange how Fulham players are no longer having near death experiences whenever they’re touched now.
Yessss!
Silva won the coaching battle, but Arteta got the three points. On we go, not looking back.
Fulham failed to get a shot on target so I think we have to pay tribute to our organisation and tactics . Lots to debate but vital win !
Not sure what coaching battle Silva won, Ned. They didn’t have a shot on target and had to rely on Taylor’s standard end-of-the-pier impression of a professional referee to stay in the game at all.
Arsenal Vs Newcastle (A), West Ham (H), Fulham (A)
24/25 – 1 point
25/26 – 9 points
Not pretty. Three points despite well-organised opposition and antipathetic officials. It’s the sign of a good team that it can win despite the errors of officials.
Over on BlueSky, WestStandTone is posting a lovely tribute to Holic and saying this was always his favourite game of the season.
https://bsky.app/profile/weststandtone.com/post/3m3ijy2jxxc2z
C100@50: That is a touching post. Is it really nearly six years? The Guv’nor is missed. And you just know he would have the most sensible thing to say of anyone about today’s game.
Nice observation from WST. He’s not wrong.
CER@47: Especially in the first half, Silva seemed to be targeting two things: cutting off the supply to Gyokeres, which in turn blunted VG’s ability to create space for others; and swarming Rice as soon as he received the ball in our half facing our goal. I think that if Rice has a scintilla of a weakness, it is his half-turn in tight spaces to break a press. It is not quite at the same elite level as everything else he does. If he is allowed to turn in our own half or receive the ball facing forward, he can then drive forward and our attacks start to flow. It is not that he loses the ball, but stopping him coming away with it, forces him to play backwards or sideways, slowing down our transitions, and lets the opposition reset defensively. I thought that Newcastle and Olympiacos were trying to do the same thing to Rice. I would suggest that one reason we didn’t look very threatening in the first half was the success of Silva’s tactic. I thought in the second half that Arteta had Rice playing higher up the pitch to counter that, and as a result, Gyokeres got more service, too.
None of which gave them any meaningful opportunities while we had potential penalty claims and actual shots on goal. I mean, good spot about Rice, but Silva’s best effort seems to have been expended on stopping one player on our side from being as good as he can be. Leaving the other 9 outfield players. I’m afraid we’ll have to disagree on the efficacy of this plan.
TBF, Silva is a good coach and did, with the not insignificant assistance of Taylor, come within a whisker (or to be more accurate, a knee) of restricting us to a single point and if Wilson had had his radar tuned properly, he might even have denied us any points at all. As Mikel observes, those margins are terribly fine.
Before the game I had a text from an old school friend who has a season ticket at the Cottage. It said ‘ I’d be happy with a 0-1’. After the game I asked him if he was happy . He replied that while Fulham huffed and puffed they didn’t lay a serious glove on Arsenal . Raya has not had to make a save for the second game running . He thought Fulham did well in restricting Arsenal but we were just too strong .
That’s a fair summary and illustrates what a formidable side we are . Three important away wins but I think the most important moment so far was Martinelli v C130y
CER@54: A fair compromise.
TTG@56: In the five most recent league games, Raya has had to deal with just seven shots on target. That is pretty impressive defending ahead of him.
@56 yeah, agree about the defense, I am
starting to feel GG era confidence once we
get in front though obviously it’s very early
for that sort of comparison
>>>>>>>