Harry Wilson stars as Fulham crack the Turf Moor curse
Sammy looks back at Saturday's historic win at Turf Moor
Goodison Park, Stamford Bridge and now Turf Moor. Records are there to be broken and in recent years we’ve been lucky enough to see some very long ones fall. Finally on Saturday, after 74 years, Fulham picked up a win away at Burnley.
Given that the Clarets are 19th in the table and were on a run of six successive defeats, it probably should have been a bit simpler, but Turf Moor was never going to let its stranglehold over Fulham go without putting up a fight.
The 3-2 victory definitely has a wide range of positives and negatives. The best thing about Fulham on Saturday night was undoubtedly Harry Wilson who played a part in all three of our goals, including what ended up being the winning goal - a beautiful and precise finish in front of the travelling Fulham supporters (massive respect to those that went up on Saturday despite the terrible public transport options)
I tweeted after the game that keeping Harry Wilson is probably the best bit of business we did in the summer. He looks super sharp and it it’s so great that he’s finally realising the potential in the top flight that we all knew he had.
Harry always had raw talent, but it feels like his game intelligence has been dialled up a notch. The split-second he took to assess his options before his cross to Calvin Bassey was evidence of a player who has really matured at this level.
Tying Harry down to a new contract feels like a no-brainer really. At 28, he has plenty of years ahead of him and surely that should be one of the club’s biggest priorities. If there was a Player of the Season vote today, I think H would be a landslide winner.
However, it would be foolish to ignore some of Fulham’s gaping holes on Saturday. Our defending at times was woeful, especially for both of Burnley’s goals. It was wonderful to see Antonee Robinson back from an attacking point of view, but the rustiness in defence was there for all to see. I know xG is a bit of a mug’s stat, but it does prove that we were sloppy and fortunate to only concede twice.
Whilst the defence had an off-night, Bernd Leno behind them certainly didn’t. The German has received deserved criticism for some of his performances of late, but Bernd looked back to his best, making four crucial stops that saved Fulham’s blushes. For me, the pick of the bunch was his brilliant positioning after Emile Smith Rowe’s ill-advised backpass went straight to Jacob Bruun Larsen.
However, many times this season, we’ve played well and not got the result. If we criticise Fulham on those occasions, we should also probably not dwell too much when we do get a result over the line. We’ve moved up to 13th in the table, leaving us with a seven point buffer to the relegation zone. Once again, we find ourselves in a position where we could advance up the table, however, we do need to record some consecutive wins to actually do it.
If you haven’t watched it yet, then Dan Cooke’s Quick Take is definitely one you should consume on Monday morning. Dan was obviously delighted to break the 74 year curse, but also rightly worried about our leakiness at the back. Dan pointed to our lack of control when we were 3-1 up, Marco really needs to find ways for us to take the sting out of games when we have the ascendency because there shouldn’t have been any need for a tense end.
In the Player Ratings, Stephen Sheldrake obviously named Harry Wilson as the MOTM, but he also had high praise for Marco Silva. He praised the team’s “distinct intensity”, which I can definitely agree with. There’s no doubt that we were well set-up and that our Portuguese gaffer is streets above his cardigan wearing counterpart.
I’d also recommend reading Owen McDonald’s brilliant assessment of proceedings, as he also looked ahead to Wednesday’s massive quarter-final against Newcastle United. Can we take advantage of their low morale after losing the Wear-Tyne derby on Sunday?
We have a massive couple of weeks ahead. A chance to reach the final 4 of a major competition and two further games against sides below us in the Premier League table. Win all three of those, and it really will be a Whites Christmas.