Manchester United’s humiliation at Fulham’s hands last season, when Roy Hodgson’s men turned over the visitors 3-0, leaves team and supporters alike thirsty for revenge on Sunday. With former Red Mark Hughes now in charge of last season’s beaten Europa League finalists, the fixture promises a lively encounter in West London.
Indeed, Craven Cottage is no happy hunting ground for Sir Alex Ferguson’s men in recent years. Last season’s calamity, in which Darren Fletcher, Michael Carrick and Ritchie de Laet formed a callow back three, compounded a 2-0 loss at the same ground in 2009. Wayne Rooney and Paul Scholes, each sent off in that fixture, will hope for better in tomorrow’s televised fixture.
“We’ve had a topsy turvy time at Fulham – we ended up with nine men two years ago,” Ferguson recalled on Friday.
“Last season we’d gone too far with the players that had played at the back. We had a great result in Wolfsburg. Fletcher, Carrick and de Laet had done ok at Fulham until we’d lost a goal.
“When you lose a goal it becomes very difficult and we became fragmented. We’d started very well, had a couple of half chances, but after we lost the goal it become difficult.”
Ferguson’s side arrives in London with only Rooney a doubtful starter of those not on the long term injury list. The striker picked up a stomach bug following United’s win over Newcastle United last Monday.
Traditionally slow starters, Ferguson’s men face 10 winnable fixtures before the visit to Eastlands on 10 November. The Scot may need a strong run, with Chelsea’s start to the season arguably even easier.
However, with several players coming back from injury or beginning pre-season late, Ferguson’s men remain short of match fitness going into the second week of the season.
“I think everyone is fit from Monday night’s game,” added Ferguson.
“I had difficulty picking a squad for Monday night’s game in the sense of the game time players have had. Michael Owen, Michael Carrick, Wayne Rooney, (Antonio) Valenica and Nani – they’ve not had the minutes yet.
“They’ve been required short of their peak or near proper match fitness. With a week’s training behind them they’ll be much better.”
“I think games brings that (match fitness) about. Wayne and Michael Owen, Michael Carrick only had an hours play before Monday. Valencia’s only had a a couple of games, Nani a couple of games. That’s not a lot in terms of the normal programme.”
Despite effectively being just two games into his pre-season, the spotlight is shining brightly on Rooney’s form, with the strikers’ last goal coming prior to an ankle injury in March. It’s the longest slump in the player’s career but with fitness questionable during the late stages of last season and the World Cup, Ferguson will hope that Rooney’s touch returns when match fitness is reached.
Whether that comes against Fulham depends on the striker’s return from a reported stomach bug.
Yet Ferguson has shown no sign of hysteria that has gripped the nation’s media in recent weeks, with one national newspaper claiming that the striker has now played more than 18 hours without a goal.
“Strikers live by their goals. When they’re not scoring they think they’re never going to come, and when they’re coming they think they’re never going to finish,” added the Scot, who scored 170 league goals as a forward for Dunfermline Athletic and Rangers, among others.
Ferguson has not picked an unchanged side in more than 140 fixtures, and the Scot faces a difficult choice between deploying Rooney as a lone frontman as is customary away from home and retaining Dimitar Berbatov, who performed well against Newcastle.
Moreover, despite Scholes’ outstanding performance on Monday night Ferguson may choose to rest the midfielder and bring Carrick into the side. Ryan Giggs is also in contention if Berbatov drops to the bench once again, although the Welshman’s place is probably contingent on Rooney’s recovery, with Chicharito waiting in the wings for a first Premier League start.
New Fulham manager Hughes is without Andy Johnson, Diomansy Kamara and defender Phillipe Senderos for the visit of his former club, with ex-red Jonathan Greening set to start on the bench.
Opposition
Team – 442 – Schwarzer, Pantsil, Konchesky, Hangeland, Hughes; Davies, Murphy, Etuhu, Duff; Gera, Zamora. Subs from – Subs from Stockdale, Zuberbühler, Baird, Kelly, Stoor, Riise, Dempsey, Milsom, Greening, Dikgacoi, E Johnson, Elm, Dembélé.
Officials
Referee: Peter Walton
Assistant referees: Dave Bryan & Andy Newbold
Fourth official: Lee Probert
Form
United – WW
Fulham – L
Rooney were said to be out due to some stomach bug.
Can anyone confirm that?
Top of the table beckons; we only need a 10-0 victory to achieve it.
lol only 10
yes true
heyyyyyyyyyyy
mad red
LOL WHAT, Hernandez praying before kick off
Gay as fuck
Sopcast… 82153… very good stream
Park starting on the wing? Kiss 10-0 goodbye; we’ll be lucky to get 2.
Scholes, class
The ball he played earlier over his head was mega n all
Somebody check on Cal that old bugger Scholes has just scored, his 150th Goal for United
Fuck… great save.
Schooooooooooooooooooolessssssssssssssssss… gettt innn!!!
Some ace first time passes
Berbatov has been excellent so far this season.
is this the official match day thread? would be good if a mod could get of its arse and arrange
HE OFFERS NOTHING
HE STANK THE PLACE OUT
I WISH HE WAS INJURED
Utter looney but would not change Cal for the world.
should be 3 up
“Stick your fucking England up your arse”
Lol “muuurderes” because Murphy had a shot and missed
come on reds
Scholes really enjoyed that goal.
Fuck’s sake
Great save but we’re struggling in midfield now
Two men int enough
Scholes… shows how a cross should be delivered.
saf having a rant on touch line
Berba, you cunt
A second goal will kill this
Fulham fancy a goal because our 2 man midfield is getting owned, and Evans is on for a shocker against Zamora
Scholes, kick Murphy’s fucking head in, the murdering scouse cunt
o’shea bumming up hageland in the corner flag
That’s another reason why I love Scholes… no drama, no rolling around… just get up and get on with it.
But Murphy may get a bit of pay back later int the game.
Every other fucking team is scoring goals galore and us ??
berbs has had at least 3 chances to score…
Why is it United look like a mid-table club trying to hang on to a lead they were fortunate to gain? I blame the team selection, specifically Park on the left and O’Shea at right back.
Good first half from both teams game is fun to watch but as always we score and go off in fucking cruise mode.
valencia has been poor most of the 1st half
Park is the secret illegitimate son.
Back in the day… Fergie knocked up some Korean prozzy… Parks mom… now Fergie plays him out of guilt.
need some more urgency in this…
cunty cunts
It’s been coming
Need to make a change
Rubbish defending… fuckin hell.
Evra got done, Evans was shite, nobody picked up Davis
Just shite
Need to dominate midfield because Fulham will fancy this now
Make a change FFS Fergie you cunt
berbatov misses coming to bite us in the arse
Now why isnt the equaliser a suprise ?
Park off for Nani… bout fuckin time.
what does oshea do
come on united.
is fletcher hiding today?
someone actually giving a fuck on the pitch would help – have we got a captain?
Oh bugger Giggs and Owen …… Cal dont do it mate leave the rope.
Come on Giggsy…
Vidic
I read that he’s great at crosswords.
Done by a simple ball
evans starts shitting himself when he sees vidic isn’t on it, he’s not there yet
Own goal
Thank fuck for OG
luncky cunts
That goal doesnt alter the fact that weve been shite.
Get out of jail.
Penalty
OG going to be our top scorer this year?
Anyway… if Nani plays from the start… we’re out of sight by now.
neither striker has the bottle to take a pen ffs
Lol this is fucking comical from Fulham
Sunday league shite this
Oh my… it’s all turned to shit for Fulham.
Poor pen from Nani.
Fucking hell
2-2
Fucking hilarious
shambles
VDS you old bastard, fuck off
any chance of jonny evan’s house being burned down
Simply not good enough !!!!
Fuck it!
fucking shite
credit to the cottagers who didnt give up
saf needs to give a good kick up the teams collective arse
and who the fuck wants to take a penalty for us?
chelsea will not be worried at all
Fuck’s sake. Chelsea will walk the league if we carry on like this.
To twice surrender a lead is absolutely criminal. We got what we deserved. The intensity and urgency we showed in the first half was missing in the second.
Took the lead and sat back. Again.
shambolic, and I hope those cunts who think its really cool that Fergus is collecting strikers realise that we have serious fucking issues in middle of park and defence
fulham, what the fuck are we gonna do against le arse, chavs, shitpool and spuds let alone the euro powerhouses.
Nani you useless waste of space, piss off back to Portugal, you useless grungy gunk.
Well done Fulham, shown United wot they have lost… the will to fight, nowadays its all fancy passing and nowt else.
at least we are a point and 3 goals better off than at the same stage last season
berbatov still pretty fucking ineffective tho
some things never change
no captain, no leader, no guts, no fucking chance.
And if Fulham are a shite Sunday League team where does that put us ?
We always start slow and there will be those who say don’t panic blah blah blah but we’re so far off the quality of the 2008 team
These games are gonna get tougher and we just don’t have enough quality
We need to improve and kids aren’t the answer
dogshit~!!!!
that is all
Everyone can complain about the lack of quality but you’re all forgetting that we raped them in the first half without scoring more than one goal.
When are we going to stop being so complacent when we take the lead?
jesus spike
youre completely clueless
we have no bollocks, to be fair we played some good stuff but we lack the killer instinct some cunt to lead us on the pitch. it’s just a case of confidence – and since Ronny left no cunt has the balls to lead the team by example and courage.
our defence was shagged last season through injury but unless rio comes back we are cunted.
Lets wait for all the Wankers to start pulling that one out of the hat, you cannot compare the form from one season to the other. And for all those wanking over Hernandez he wasnt exactly cooking today was he, though he should eventually come good.
yep, having calmed down a bit it’s true we bummed them but time and time again we lack the will and urgency and god damn bollocks to but the boot in. we play like ballerina’s in tu tus and bend over like Graham Norton at G.A.Y listening to the Scissor Scistors.
it’s SO bad.
fulham stood up and wanted to win more
simple really
They do this at Old Trafford as well. Nothing new. You don’t see Chelsea whip out the cigars when they’re a goal up.
I hope this result doesn’t come back to bite us in the arse if the title race ends up as close as last year’s.
It’s having a leader too, Sid. Ronney may not have been the cap but in effort and skill he was the best in 2008, and de fact captain.
We need someone to grab the game and nail the opposition.
Also, Flectcher turned into shit player again today – where was the cunt
Once upon a time United fought tooth and nail till the whistle blew regardless of the score, once upon a time if you scored against United we scored at least 2 more.
Where have these days gone, these days no team is scared to play us as was once the case.
Yep, Ash that is a fair point – and this is where Looney Cal is not so looney but makes a lot of sense.
The God that is Scholes cannot do more than 60 mins. Sure he can play but he looses his power and strength and poor old duffer cannot handle it.
It was fucking so obvious today that he needed to subbed.
We get worse during a game and we have FUCK ALL IMPACT SUBSTITUTE.
Because Fulham bottled the first 20 minutes like most teams do against us
Once they got their confidence they started playing, and soon had us figured out hence why they came back into the game
They started getting tight, passing and moving, and Scholes and Fletcher didn’t know whether to stay or go
Fulham can play a bit and they move really well, that’s why I was surprised to see Fergie play 442 – with 2 central midfielders against them. He must think they’re shite.
Scholes has to do a shitload of running in a 2 man midfield n all. At his age he should always have 2 players around him IMO.
We need more quality, it’s obvious. We got 80 odd points on a wing and a prayer last season. We lost a lot of matches by our standards, and made it look hard against the riff raff. That’s a sign we’re lacking.
Fergie has spent £20m, but on young players we won’t see the benefit of for years
fletcher was invisible today but more often than not he makes his presence felt
yes we should have buried them in the 1st 30 mins – berbatov guilty of poor finishing
but overall i don’t think its an entire disaster since we could have been 2-1 down at more than 1 point in the 2nd half – little pea will come good starting with west ham next week
Fergie is a thick cunt with his subs – shld have supported or subbed scholes – it was really thick what he did there.
Taggart was probably thinking about buying another striker
Aye, no captain, no one with any real bottle, no big time cunts like Ronaldo, no men FFS
You look at the goals we gave away and this is what I partially mean when I say that we were complacent.
For the first, what the fuck was Evra thinking letting Duff run past him like that? The second goal was a comedy of errors. Poor marking at a corner and Van der Sar should have done much better than to simply palm the ball into the net.
What else could he do? He doesn’t trust Berbatov in the lone striker role, Hernandez is inexperienced, and Owen is a fitness question mark? Strange that he should be confronted with such a problem, though; there’s no value in the market, and he has all the players he needs to win the league.
Aye, well Fergie’s a cunt, that’s a given
What else could we have done? 451 with Berba up top, Giggs in the hole, Scholes & Fletch behind and Nani & Valencia on both flanks who can tuck in when we’re not in possession to create a 5
The pitch is small there n all so we’d have suffocated them
Fergie should have given them a bit of credit for reaching a European Final FFS but instead he treat them like a Wigan or a Blackpool who we can beat on our own terms
Lets wait and see with the attitude from today I wonder.
IM LOOKING FORWARD TO SEE WHAT LKHF PIONEER UNCLEKNOBHEADFORFUCKSSAKE HAS TO SAY ABOUT TODAYS TRAVESTY!!
IN FACT NO, IM DREADING TO SEE WHAT HE HAS TO SAY AS HE WILL WILL BRING HELL FIRE TO THE LKHFUNITEDRANT FORUM
LKHF
Look… the simple fact is we overachieved last year, largely on the back of Rooney’s excellence.
But we are simply not a very good team anymore… period.
Look at our team today… full of mediocrity and mid table talent, and players just not ready.
O’Shea and Park… decent squad players… first teamers for a team like Fulham… not starters for United.
Valencia, Fletcher… decent players… but I’d rather THEY were our squad players, because we should have better.
Scholes… great player, but just doesn’t have 90 hard minutes in him anymore… should be resigned to the knackers yard, and yet… he’s still the best we’ve got… pitiful.
Hernandez, Evans… may be the bollocks in time, but they’re not ready to depend on yet… these players need to be eased in alongside the better players, so they can learn their trade… not chucked in the deep end to sink or swim.
We needed to bring in 2 or 3 top established players, to compliment what we’ve already got… not start collecting unproven talent just for the fuck of it.
I’m so disappointed right now… not just cause of todays result… but because, I expect a lot more of this dreck over the rest of the season.
Rooney… fit and firing will definitely help, but not enough.
Top 4? probably… top 2? doubtful… Champions?…not a hope in hell… Not with this team.