Would this side beat Derby’s infamous Premier League points total? Probably not, as they’d not be able to string 38 consecutive appearances together. Still, I think, on balance, this is our worst Premier League XI. Not necessarily purely on stats, but vibes too. We’ve been relegated three times, which gives ample candidates for a piece like this, but I’ve tried to spread that indignity out across the three campaigns (and a couple from other years).
Right - when can the real football return then?
GK: Sergio Rico
This is partly because I’m still annoyed we dismantled the vibes of Slav’s play-off-winning locker room by dropping Marcus Bettenelli, and partly because he shipped an average of nearly two goals a game across 29 starts. The squad needed upgrading, sure. But Betts had kept 14 clean sheets the previous campaign. An upgrade this most certainly was not.
RB: Timothy Fosu-Mensah
The Dutchman was a highly-rated youngster at Manchester United, having arrived from the academy at Ajax (where else?) as a 16 year old. He’d proven himself in the Premier League a season earlier at Crystal Palace, but it did not go well for him in SW6. 12 appearances, 27 conceded - the nadir being the OG that gave Huddersfield a 1-0 victory in November. Still only 28, he’s currently without a club after leaving Bayer Leverkusen in 2024.
CB: Håvard Nordtveit
Four appearances. Four defeats. 10 conceded. It’s easy to see why Nordtveit is often cited as a player who personified the atrocious 18-19 season. There are mitigating circumstances: the basket case of a campaign and the fact that we already had five recognised centre-backs at the time he signed. Still, he was among the worst of them.
CB: Alfie Mawson
It didn’t go well for poor Alfie; injuries absolutely destroyed his time at the club. But this is the worst Premier League XI, and when he did play, he didn’t do well. 28 goals conceded in just 15 appearances tells its own story as the Whites cycled through centre-backs during perhaps its most disastrous Premier League campaign.
LB: Layvin Kurzawa
Kurzawa came from French giants PSG, but showed why some people call Ligue 1 a farmer’s league. OK, to be fair to PSG, Kurzawa arrived in SW6 without playing a competitive fixture in two seasons (we don’t talk enough about recent recruitment missteps do we?) His debut was what nightmares are made of; the 4-1 drubbing at home to Newcastle, during which he made the Magpies look as good as his parent club. He bagged a couple of goals in the FA Cup, but that doesn’t count.
CM: Ibrahima Cissé
I almost forgot Cissé played for us full stop, let alone in the Premier League. But he made three appearances for us in the top flight, and unsurprisingly failed to pull up trees in any of them. One for a forgotten Fulham XI.
CM: Derek Boateng
We all know we were sleepwalking towards relegation from 2012 onwards, but signings like Boateng show just how checked out Al Fayed was. We signed the midfielder from prestigious Ukrainian giants… FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk at the ripe old age of 30. I think the groundsman was moonlighting as head scout for this one. Three league appearances followed then off he popped. Rubbish.
CM: Emmanuel Frimpong
Dench? More like dire. The Arsenal youngster, known more for his social media and musical exploits than actually playing football, arrived on loan in January 2013, having never made more than half-a-dozen league appearances in any of his four senior seasons to that point. Six was the same number as he managed in half a season with us.
RW: André Schürrle
A big name that delivered very little. This one could be somewhat controversial, but I genuinely thought he was crap in a season where the crap bar was exceedingly high. The man was a World Cup winner, but came to Fulham seemingly losing interest in professional football (which proved true as he retired aged 29).
LW: Aboubakar Kamara
A loveable rogue? Perhaps. A Premier League footballer? No sir. Half a season produced just three league goals - plus a bust-up with Mitro over a penalty he eventually missed and a training ground fight. It might have ben box office for the press, but it didn’t serve us at all.
ST: Kostas Mitroglou
Who else? How can you go from bagging 17 in 19 appearances for Olympiacos to blanking in three appearances for Fulham despite his huge fee, before going back to the Greek club on loan and scoring 19 in 34? Shocking - and rightly our worst-ever Premier League signing.
I started this piece thinking it would be easy to assemble this line-up. Spoiler: it wasn’t. Who have I missed out? Who was a harsh inclusion? Let me know in the comments.
Harsh on Rico when Fabri was 10x worse!