Player Ratings: Fulham 2-2 Liverpool

The ratings are in after a thrilling finale at Craven Cottage on Sunday.

A surprise screamer from Harrison Reed gave Fulham a deserved point against the champions on Sunday, and extended our unbeaten run in the Premier League to five games ahead of Wednesday’s derby with the managerless blue lot down the road. VAR nearly had a big say in the result, but thankfully we leave the weekend with another point on the board and another Howard Webb apology in the pipeline. COYW!

Bernd Leno

Not sure if there’s much blame to land at Leno’s door for the goals. Certainly not for the second anyway, but maybe there’s an argument he could’ve got out quicker to deny Wirtz, but that’s potentially reaching a tad. Thought his distribution was mixed, playing round the press decently enough but landing way too many long balls into no man’s land. Never really commanded his box at set pieces either, which is something I’m noticing quite a lot of late. 6/10

Issa Diop

Diop feels like he’s reached the same sort of territory Cuenca has been in since he joined the club. Every time he steps in to play, as rare as that is of late, he looks very solid and rarely lets you down. Seemed far too strong physically in duels against Liverpool’s fairly lightweight front six full of midfielders. Can’t critique him for playing Wirtz onside for the equaliser because most of us don’t actually think he did. Looked very assured on the ball too, with the best pass completion rate of the back three backing that thought up. 7/10

Joachim Andersen

Joa has had a bad week and it continued here with another worryingly poor performance. There was a stage between 1-1 and 2-1 where I felt he re-composed and defended our box really well with the number of clearances he made but beyond that it was bad. Even before the first goal it was worrying that he allowed the fairly tiny Alexis Mac Allister to beat him in the air and nearly score. Then for the first he was poor to allow Bradley in ahead of him to set up Wirtz. The defending for Gakpo’s goal was even worse with the way he completely failed to deal with the cross from the right hand side of the box. His long ball abilities were poor too, completing just two out of however many. 3.5/10

Jorge Cuenca

Fairly eventless showing compared to the dramatics against Crystal Palace. Just went around doing the basics to the best of his ability. Safe and sound on the ball, eight clearances with the majority being in the second half when Liverpool were on top a lot and the most tackles of any Fulham player on the pitch. No complaints here. 7/10

Timothy Castagne

Probably one of his more solid showings of the season off the back of an awful cameo off the bench at Selhurst Park. Made a fantastic recovery run across the six yard box to make a great block on a Curtis Jones effort at the front post half an hour in. Positionally he was decent enough, if not a bit negative at times and a tad naïve to Liverpool dropping balls over the top of him to Kerkez. Hopefully that solidity remains into the derby with it seeming like Tete might have a spell on the sidelines. 6.5/10

Sasa Lukic

Very much like Cuenca I thought everything was neat and tidy with little error. His passing was safe and intricate and to only commit one foul is quite the effort for him across 90 minutes. I think what let him down was that TC next to him showed him up a bit. You’d expect Lukic to noticeably get about more but I don’t think he necessarily did. Equally, it felt like against Palace he picked up lots of positions between the lines, whereas here I don’t feel he did. 6/10

Tom Cairney

His goal at Palace earned him this start and I thought he made the most of the opportunity. Dropped deep a lot on the ball to help dictate play better than Putin dictates Russia, spraying the ball through the lines to the front three. Also loved the energy he showed to win second balls in the middle of the pitch, despite Silva saying pre-game that part of the reasoning behind the back three was to accommodate and protect Cairney. If he starts in the derby, he’ll have earned his spot and nobody else at this club knows just how much we want to win that game. 7/10

Antonee Robinson

Just like at Selhurst, I wasn’t very impressed with Jedi’s showing. I think it took him far too long to start giving Smith Rowe any support going forward, and when he did he was rather wasteful with the ball bar one decent ball into Raul. For the Gakpo goal, his defending is quite lazy, getting out to the crosser quite slowly and putting in the most nonchalant jump with his back to his man which provided no deterrent to the ball into the box. Sess will reclaim his place in the side quite easily if things don’t improve. 5/10

Harry Wilson

Maybe a poor showing v Palace and the prospect of playing his former club filled H with hunger, but this was a good bounce back from Thursday evening. His goal was on the back of a cracking run in behind, times to perfection despite the linesman’s best efforts to disagree, and finished with complete conviction of a man in good goal-scoring form. Came close twice at 1-1 too, with one long range effort deflecting over the bar via the boot of Jones and a chipped effort over Alisson bouncing back off the top of the bar. Contributed really well out of position too, keeping to his shape and tracking back brilliantly. 7.5/10 – man of the match

Emile Smith Rowe

Similarly to Wilson, I thought ESR was superb in his defensive duties, providing great structural support to the midfield and tracking back to support Jedi when needed, with one particularly good intervention in our own penalty area in the first half. Think he struggled to impact the game as much on the ball, often not getting the best service down the left hand side compared to just behind the striker. 6.5/10

Raul Jimenez

Continues to show the genius he can produce with just a single touch. The way he plays the ball on from near the halfway line with such instinct at the perfect angle and speed is just ridiculous to me. His intelligence is something I can rarely compare to other Fulham players across the 21st century. Like the rest of the front three, he also tracked back when necessary to support the team effort. Loved the nod to Rodrigo Muniz too with an overly ambitious overhead kick. 7/10

Substitutes

Kevin

Really impressed with how he replaced Smith Rowe for that last 25 minutes and didn’t lose us any stability off the ball, using his additional energy to win second balls whilst keeping focused to keep our shape out of possession. Also ended up getting a vital assist at the end, playing the ball to Harrison for his equaliser. While the goal and confidence in front of goal isn’t there yet, his commitment to the team is not in doubt. 6.5/10

Sander Berge

Thought Berge had a weirdly terrible cameo when he replaced the skipper. He was so poor in his duels and looked like a lost puppy running around in the middle of the park. He kept misplacing passes too and was lucky it never cost us. Obviously didn’t matter in the end and it’s not often he has to come off the bench but blimey I was surprised at how poor he was. 4/10

Adama Traore, Jonah Kusi-Asare and Harrison Reed came on too late to be fairly assessed, but it would be remiss of me not to credit Reed for his absolute thunderbolt, he can have a token 10/10 from me.

Marco Silva

Made some bold choices moving to a back three putting Cairney in from the start, as well as playing a front three that tries to run in behind but without the pace of Kevin and Adama. For the most part, those choices worked well. ESR and Wilson were outstanding out of possession, as were the whole team in the way they kept such a tight 5-4-1 structure throughout to thwart Liverpool’s attacking intentions through the middle of the pitch.

My one concern throughout is that we defended so narrowly that if Liverpool ever went wide, we may struggle, and that came to fruition for Gakpo’s late goal, but thankfully we got a goal back to counteract that moment. Maybe could have been a tad more proactive with substitutes when Liverpool were on top in the second half, but overall, I thought Silva did well tactically and negotiated a lack of depth proactively, however I beg of him never to use two goalkeepers on the bench again. Give Esenga or Loupalo-Bi the experience for goodness sake! 7.5/10