Player Ratings: Fulham 4-5 Manchester City

Our assessment of a completely bonkers nine-goal thriller at the Cottage.

Fulham nearly pulled off one of English football’s greatest ever comebacks against Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, after a dismal first 50 minutes of football left the Whites 5-1 down thanks to an absurdly negative set-up from Marco Silva who, not for the first time against Pep, paid him and his side a silly amount of respect. Ultimately, Fulham just fell short despite the best efforts of Chuk and co. Here we go then…

Bernd Leno

Yeah - it probably goes without saying in a game where we conceded five, but thought there was a lot of errors here. I’ve long worried about Leno’s distribution but it looked particularly poor here, including in added time as we pushed for a fifth, throwing it directly to Cherki at one point. Considering how well he punched versus Tottenham, his weak attempt that fell back to Foden and left him in a poor position in the goal was bad goalkeeping for City’s third. The fourth, Foden’s second, should never be allowed to go in considering Foden is forced wide and Leno gets out to him, but he just doesn’t close the angle appropriately. 3.5/10

Kenny Tete

I jut hope he didn’t come off at half time because of a knock; it’s never good when he’s in and out of a team, especially with the drop in quality to Castagne (more on that later). Maybe could have been more proactive in defending City’s second as Reijnders ran through, but that’s as far as I could critique Tete in a fairly difficult first half for everyone involved. 6/10

Joachim Andersen

Defensively and from a leadership perspective I’ve given Joa nothing but praise in recent weeks - not today. He should never be stepping up for the second goal; it caused massive uncertainty in the middle of our defence. The ball literally goes through him as if he doesn’t exist for the fourth, too. The lack of coherence and organisation from him in key moments was disastrous. Definitely did his best to get us back in the game. 105 passes from anyone in a game is absurd, and some of his long balls to the wings to get us on the attack in the last half hour were crucial. However, those negatives from a defensive perspective can’t be ignored. 5/10

Calvin Bassey

Like Tete, despite us conceding five, I don’t think there’s too much blame to be individually apportioned to Calvin. Maybe he could do better for the second as Reijnders went through, but the issue comes from Andersen stepping out irresponsibly. At points I was delighted to see the proactive, positive Bassey back. He had moments of aggressively intercepting near the halfway line and running beyond the midfield afterwards. Really good to see. 6.5/10

Ryan Sessegnon

Was a bit disappointed with Sess’s defending for Man City’s opener in the way he’s caught ball-watching and completely misses the fact the world’s best goalscorer is behind him ready to pounce. Bar that, thought he matched City’s right side quite well, always looking to pin them back. Did his fair share in the final stages to try and get in areas to help us create an equaliser, but never quite got the ball in the right spaces to be effective. 6/10

Sander Berge

Obviously a lot of it could have been down to the set-up, but it felt quite depressing to see Berge revert to the mean in this one. He was completely ineffective in transitioning the game in our favour, whether it be from failing to win the ball from City’s defensive players or choosing to play backwards passes time after time. Even in the second half when we were all over them, he slowed down play far too often. He will be lucky to get away with the fifth not being put down as his own goal, too. 4/10

Sasa Lukic

Had Lukic continued playing at that level for the second half, it may have been my first ever score below a one. Marco was completely right to hook him at half time and had he taken him off 20 minutes earlier it would have been justified. Every touch or pass when in a decent area were terrible. Every set piece or tackle attempt was beyond feeble. One of the worst individual halves I’ve seen, and weirdly from a completely competent footballer - he’s no Mark Fotheringham. Even this score feels generous. 2/10

Harry Wilson

I thought he did superbly off the ball, having to track back an absurd amount to cover the lack of transitional efforts from our famously amazing double pivot. Put in an amazing cross on his weaker foot to set up Smith Rowe for our first goal and constantly look to put threating balls in. Lacked a bit of pace on the counter but still posed a threat throughout. 6.5/10

Emile Smith Rowe

Another really positive showing and a goal to show for it. His looping header across Donnarumma was a superb, inventive piece of attacking play that shows another string to his bow. Had previously had a cracking low effort saved fantastically by Donnarumma, which would have got the game back to 1-1. Never stopped pressing City’s centre backs with intensity and probably earned his place in the XI this weekend against Palace. 7.5/10

Alex Iwobi

Iwobi was the man who created said chance for ESR early on with a beautiful pass, which summed up his efforts at that stage of the game. While, like Wilson, he didn’t really look to take the game to City with any pace, he did look like the one man in our side able to play a defence-splitting pass that would cause City real issues. Despite a wonderful finish to kick-start our second-half resurgence, he faded in the middle. It’s really hard to judge where his best position is from week to week. 7/10

Raul Jimenez

In that first half an hour or so where Fulham showed little to no positivity, it was only really Raul who was looking to play the ball forward or take the game to City’s defenders in a physical manner. Despite looking knackered, as he often does, he never gave up and had a couple of decent half chances fall his way as Fulham started taking the game to their opposition. One forced a block from Nico Gonzalez while another from close range got a save out of Donnarumma. 6/10

Substitutes

Samuel Chukwueze

Don’t cha wish ya winger was Chukwueze? (Future Sugababes-inspired this’ll catch on - watch this space). Well I wish he was ours - permanently. The boy is magic and this cameo was extraordinary as he replaced Lukic at the interval. His goalscoring duck was broken - and emphatically. Both finishes on the half-volley from rebounds were hit with accuracy, power and control, and found alternative corners to bring Fulham from consolation territory to 4-5 and back in the game. Every dribble moved City’s defence sideways and backwards from both sides of the pitch. We have to pay the fee and give Milan a little extra as a thank you for showing us a truly special player. I love him. 9.5/10 – man of the match.

Timothy Castagne

He genuinely might’ve managed a worse 45 than Lukic, he was that bad. The drop-off from Tete in that position when Castagne isn’t on it is utterly terrifying. Tete is one of the best one v one defenders about. Then, for the first 10 minutes of the second half, Castagne backtracks every time anyone comes near him rather than engaging them in a battle. City’s fourth and fifth goals come from that exact scenario. Then, as we go into the ascendency, Castagne misplaces every pass and touch in the final third. There’s a ‘consistent’ player there sometimes, and he showed that especially at Leicester, but goodness me, I need to see it more often, especially if Tete has a knock. This showing was completely abhorrent. 2/10

Josh King

Replaced ESR and did well drifting across the front three positions on and off the ball to keep pushing Fulham on and pressuring the City defence into resorting to long balls or mistakes. Had his first Premier League goal at the Cottage been to make it 5-5 against City, I’m not sure the pool would’ve stayed attached to the top of the Riverside, alas, it will remain one of the biggest ‘what if’s’ in Fulham folklore. 6.5/10

Jonah Kusi-Asare

This was the cameo that made a lot of us see the potential in the boy from Bayern. He pressed with such an intensity that meant he constantly got touches on their centre-backs’ passes and caused complete panic. Competed really well in the air, even more so than Rau,l who he replaced, and held the ball up nicely in tight spaces. Could’ve even won a penalty at 4-5, getting his body ahead of O’Reilly well and earning contact from City’s left-back. 7/10

Kevin

I wouldn’t normally compliment someone coming on as late as Kevin did when he replaced Wilson with nine minutes remaining of normal time, but his impact is worth talking about. At first he looked a bit timid against his full-back, but the moment he got to the byline for the first time he started to thrive and time after time he stayed wide, received a long ball and beat his man. His ball across the box in the 96th minutewas begging for a recipient and his pass to King was so close to earning a point. So much promise once more from our record signing. 7/10

Marco Silva

I fear a lot of the narrative will be positive from the comeback we made and so nearly executed, but praise for that must go to the players, not the management. All that did was prove that we have talent far beyond the negativity Silva so often resorts to.

Going back to the double pivot of Berge and Lukic, which hardly ever works, could maybe have been justified because of the opponent, but tht was quickly proven to be terrible management as the two midfielders provided no defensive solidarity or creativity going the other way. It forced attackers to come back deep to support so when we tried playing on the counter, those names were coming from deep and as they aren’t Chuk, Kev or Adama, didn’t have the pace to get on beyond Raul to make the most of rare opportunities.

All you had to do was look at Leeds at the weekend in the second half to see that City don’t want to be got at, but stubborn Silva reverted to his negative mindset, which meant that, until the players decided to show some professional pride, we were an absolute embarrassment in all aspects of the game. After three wins in four and building momentum (which may still exist with the nature of this game), to see that thrown away to go back to a failing system is poor, naïve management of a talented squad which deserve more faith in their abilities from their manager in the way they are set up. The only credit Marco gets is for making the changes at half time rather than waiting for longer. 2.5/10