The Hammers weren’t able to capitalise on Fulham resting seven, that’s right Sullivan, seven of their European heroes in a game that did nothing much to suggest West Ham deserve any better than a seventeenth place league finish.
After a very slow start to the game, West Ham began to control possession and had a couple of cracking efforts through Noble and Da Costa. With a sublime touch to take the ball past the Fulham defender on the edge of the 18 yard, Noble fired a low curler that Schwarzer pushed past his left post. Da Costa must have got bored chipping speculative balls towards Carlton Cole and instead he thumped a 40 yard rocket heading directly for the top left corner. Sadly not enough movement on the ball though and Schwarzer had no trouble tipping it over. So far so good. Fulham had hit the bar through Dempsey and they did seem to be causing Spector a bit of trouble down the right, but with half time round the corner and the chance to make a couple of all out attacking changes, the game remained for the taking. That is until Fulham played a neat move on the left that tore apart our defence and left Dempsey free to strike a cool finish low to Green’s right. Incredibly frustrating given the timing of the goal and the ease with which Fulham ran rings round our midfield and defence. Their goal amounted to about ten second’s worth of decisive attacking play, a simple change of tempo and we were taken apart.
Sadly the second half brought no immediate changes. Cole had been ineffectual in the 1st half, but a Franco-Ilan partnership is perhaps seen as too weak to lead the line. No sight of birthday boy Diamanti, no Daprela and no LBM. I know it was only half time, but in a game that amounts to little more than a friendly for Fulham and an exercise in pride for the Irons, why not make a couple of half time changes? Noble started the 2nd half fired up and the little that we created came through him. Sadly a cruel deflection put Fulham two up, but the all to familiar inability to deal with set pieces had played a part. We were given a glimmer of hope through Cole’s flick from a good set piece from Noble, but despite Diamanti and Franco’s introduction, we simply didn’t mount an attacking threat. Again speculative chipped balls towards Cole were the only tactic. Fulham got their third through a mistake from Spector, Riise robbing him whilst the American attempted a clearance and his ball across the six yard box finding an unmarked Okaka who smashed the ball past Green. The consolation goal was really well worked, an indication of what the team can achieve when they use the width of the pitch and keep the ball on the deck. A nice bit of interplay from Parker and Noble on the left saw Noble free to burst towards the box, Parker had continued his run, Noble duly played it through to him and Parker’s subsequent pull-back found Franco who finished the move off with a controlled finish. A nice move, but the game was already dead and buried.
A win would have put us in fourteenth place and given the fans something to smile about before the inevitable Sullivan led media circus that will accompany the ‘restructuring’ in the summer. Problem is we didn’t deserve anything from the game. The limitations of playing with four central midfielders are painfully clear, as is our lack of pace going forward. Conceding three to a below par Fulham has to go down as a defensive disaster and for me the blame will always lie with Upson (Spector is too easy a target!) as he is supposedly our captain and allegedly good enough to play for England. His decision making yesterday was poor throughout the game. He and Green should be commanding our back-line, but we are way too fragile. When the wholesale changes arrive, it is unquestionably the defence that needs the biggest shake up.
Ironworks man of the match - Mark Noble.
