In yet another hammer blow to the nails in Fulham’s coffin, Southampton inflicted a 2-0 defeat upon the Cottagers on Wednesday evening, consigning Fulham to yet another loss that surely compounds their inevitable relegation.
No team is finding it difficult against Claudio Ranieri’s side at the moment, not even for Southampton, one of their clearest relegation rivals – Ralph Hasenhüttl‘s side have been on a poor run of late but, as everybody seems to do, found Fulham to be relatively obliging guests in the Saints’ quest for three points.
Hasenhüttl has transformed Redmond and Ward-Prowse
Although Southampton’s relatively new manager has found some of the same problems still present at St. Mary’s – brittle in defence and toothless in attack – there is no doubt that he has found the ability and confidence that was inside two of Southampton’s brightest attacking talents – Nathan Redmond and James Ward-Prowse. They combined for the second goal on Wednesday, with Redmond’s shot being palmed straight into the path of Ward-Prowse, who finished confidently.
It is their overall upturn in performances however, their drive and newfound confidence, that can be attributed to Ralph Hasenhüttl. Both players are 24, both players had a lot expected from them, and maybe this is the time where their talents are realised in a more regular, more exciting way.
Fulham play themselves into trouble once again
Despite the talent at the heart of that second Southampton goal, that quality was only present at the end of a disastrous series of passes and touches from Fulham. In trying to play their way out of trouble, Fulham managed to hand the ball right back to their opponents which exposes once again an ability from the club to learn from their own mistakes.
The desire for the team to pass their way out of trouble has come from both of the two managers that Fulham have employed this season, yet the team has never been particularly good at it and this kind of goal seems to be happening on a regular basis. Just like how teams exploit Fulham’s weakness at set-pieces or their wandering wing-backs, this is not a new problem and yet it has failed to be addressed. A change of plan isn’t needed now; it was needed months ago.
Despite this win, Southampton still have a nervous end to the season
Only one club had the potential for their fate to be properly solidified by the end of the match, and it wasn’t Southampton – as their manager Ralph Hasenhüttl described it, this was less a ‘must-win’ rather than a ‘should-win’. It would not be diminishing of Southampton’s efforts to suggest that they did exactly what was expected of them on Wednesday: it lifts them out of the relegation zone by one point but there are clearly so many more twists and turns for the team to come.
Next up? Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool in three of their next four games. Things may get worse before they get better.
In their ambition, Fulham have let down the team that got them promoted
It feels like so long ago since Fulham were celebrating their play-off final win at Wembley, Tom Cairney’s goal seeing off Aston Villa to reach the Premier League dream. Only five of those eleven players, the eleven heroes of Wembley, were involved in the team against Southampton, with golden-child of the Championship Ryan Sessegnon finding himself only a small-part player in this new regime of failure.
The fans are starting to take this erosion of old heroes out on the manager now. Ranieri was booed when taking off Tom Cairney in the second half of this game and jeered when he put Sessegnon on too late in the match. Whether it is Ranieri’s fault that the squad has been shaped like this, with big money signings taking priority over the trusted old faces, is very much up for debate.
If the Jean Michaël Seri bubble hadn’t already burst, it has now
Out of all of those big-money signings of the summer, the one that rose the most eyebrows and impressed the most onlookers was that of Jean Michaël Seri, the playmaker who had oh-so-recently been touted to join the likes of Barcelona. Yet, despite a rasping goal against Burnley in an early season game, Seri has failed to impress in a Fulham shirt; he is too physically lightweight and too obviously shaken mentally having made mistakes.
Yet it was still a real surprise to see him omitted from the match-day squad entirely against Southampton, especially because of how defensively focused and uninspiring Fulham’s midfield looked without him. For all of Seri’s obvious detractions at this point in time, it seemed unwise by Ranieri to set up without that creative spark in the centre of that midfield – Seri may not be able to bully his marker but he can pick a wonderful pass, a skill that Fulham should probably try to utilise before it really is too late.
