Taking a trip to eastern Russia for a Europa League match is not an easy chore for any English club. Despite a two-goal advantage heading into Thursday's match with Amkar Perm, there were still some nervy supporters hoping that the Cottagers could put behind Sunday's loss to Chelsea and right the ship in Russia. Fortunately, the Cottagers were able to withstand the Russians on this day and despite losing the match 1-0, the Whites advanced to the group stage with a 3-2 aggregate win to advance.
Roy Hodgson fielded a less than full strength squad in Russia. Players like Seol Ki-Hyeon, Bjorn Helge Riise, Zoltan Gera, Stephen Kelly and Chris Baird were all involved in Thursday's match.
Despite the team lacking some of the punch and power it has shown in its' three previous European matches, the Cottagers were able to do just enough to get past Amkar Perm and book a spot in the group stage of this competition.
Fulham did lost 1-0 on Thursday, but the lone Amkar Perm goal came in second half stoppage time so there was little time after the goal to get the second goal the Russians would have needed to advance.
The group stage draw will take place tomorrow in Monaco. It is at that point that Fulham will find out what other clubs will be in their group.
While I did not get a chance to watch the match, the result does please me and I am sure other Fulham supporters around the world.
Now back to league play on Sunday at Villa Park against Aston Villa. That will not be easy.
Comments
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Posted by Theodore Bennett on 08/31/2009
I saw much of the Aston Villa game. Fulham does not do well with most of the possession. We must counterattack effectively for quality chances. Villa simply repeated what they had done to Liverpool the week before; they defended to the teeth and counterattacked effectively into all that open space.
This is what Fulham must do. Do the rope-a-dope. Sucker them in...otherwise, we do not have the quality of world class finishers in the final third. With the counterattack Eddie Johnson likely is the best option. He has blinding speed and the character to take instruction. I hope Sir Hodgson takes the opportunity to break in Eddie more quickly before too many negative league results pile up...
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Posted by David on 08/31/2009
Saw the Villa game as well. They sorely missed Murphy. Etuhu and Greening were pretty in effective offensively. Murphy is always good for a clever ball to spring somebody. I think both Duff and Dempsey need to get out wide more to open up some space in the middle. Nevland and Kamara were both ineffective. You never realize how good AJ And Zamora are, despite there low goal tallies, until you see the team without them. I'd have liked to see EJ on sooner. Also think perhaps Hodgson should have brought on Riise or Gera to try and shake things up.
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Posted by James on 09/01/2009
i think we are feeling the effects of playing in Europe and have taken a toll due too injury on AJ... if we can stay healthy and be able too not have our MAIN guys play 90 minutes on Thurs and Sunday... Murphy, Dempsey and mayb switch out another midfielder... cus i could see how tired Dempsey was against Aston Villa... he was making poor decisions passing and also not out wide taking people on like he normally did for us last year... and yes seeing EJ on sooner wouldve been nice... his pace can be really effective against other teams and mayb open up the midfield a bit more for us
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