Oh dear. Just three games into the campaign, and the grand dream of “Galácticos on the Thames” is already floating face-down past Craven Cottage. We’ve handed our local rivals three points, looked toothless away at Sunderland, and were comprehensively dismantled by a winless Crystal Palace side.
Standing on the touchline, Álvaro Arbeloa - with his jet-black dyed hair and trademark blazer with rolled-up sleeves - is looking less like a tactical visionary and more like a panicked magician whose white rabbit has just died mid-trick.
His signature illusion - making Fulham’s defensive shape completely vanish - has been a roaring success, though perhaps not in the way Shahid and Tony Khan envisioned when they backed his lavish Real Madrid academy recruitment drive.
Dropping a cohort of fresh-faced young Spaniards directly into the meat-grinder of English football just feels a bit cruel at this point. Not since the Spanish Armada have so many Iberians been sent to such a tragic, predictable doom.
Making our defensive shape vanish isn’t his only trick though… he appears to have done the same with our £34.6m record-signing Kevin. Reports claim that the new manager and our Brazilian starlet have fallen out so spectacularly, that the winger is set to leave the club in January, if Arbeloa hasn’t disappeared in a puff of smoke himself beforehand.
To make matters worse, the upcoming schedule reads like an horror film. Next up is a trip to Anfield. Fantastic. Then comes Manchester United at home - a fixture we haven’t won since the Bush administration… This is followed by an away day at newly-promoted Ipswich Town, who demonstrated with their victory over Sunderland that they’re no whipping boys. It is terrifyingly easy to see Arbeloa staring down the barrel of six straight defeats.
Which brings us to the inevitable fork in the road. Do the Khans swallow their billionaire pride, rip the band-aid off now, and admit they hired a slick-haired charlatan?
Or do they double down, risk total catastrophe, and leave it so late that our only salvation is begging Eddie Howe/Sean Dyche/Sam Allardyce/any other jobbing English manager to step in and drag us to 17th place? Either way, by the time Coventry arrive at The Cottage, the illusion will be well and truly over - one way or the other.
Great article full of negativity and pointing fingers, with no attempt at understanding and believing in a new project that could work once things fall into place. Just what the Fulham fanbase needs at the minute…
What a load of bandwagon shite. 35 games to go. The timing of a new gaffa is a godsend to Kevin. Excuse to sod off. Hardly performed at all last season. ESR is another. AA isnt the whole issue here. Lazy players too.