The summer so far: Fulham

by Richard Allen

Where to begin? Mark Hughes? Martin Jol? Europe via the back door? Off-season? What off-season?
First things first: Mark Hughes always felt like someone else’s manager. He did his best to look interested, but there were always undertones there, like he was doing us a favour by managing us: “look, it’s me, Mark Hughes. The Mark Hughes. At Fulham!”  When he left to broaden his horizons or to find himself (in Dubai), well, nobody was that surprised or disappointed. At the time of writing he remains unemployed, with all the good jobs having been taken. The job Hughes thought he might get went to Alex McLeish! 

Hughes did quite well for Fulham, no doubt: the main goal was to not break Roy Hodgson’s well-oiled machine, and despite a few hairy moments he succeeded at that and maybe took the machine to a new level of… oiledness. Once Bobby Zamora came back from injury we really did look a serious side. A side indeed who scored more points in the second half of the season, than all but the top five teams. But then, following an eighth place finish and with European football secured, Hughes decided to move on to bigger and better things, and now we had to start again, again.

By happy coincidence Jol was available. You may recall that we nearly hired him last summer. Fulham thought they had their man, but Ajax dug their heels in. These things usually resolve themselves in the favour of the courting party, but no, his contract was water-tight and Fulham’s board returned from Amsterdam with egg on their faces. 

This time around Fulham wasted no time in confirming his appointment, thus avoiding the stasis of Roy Hodgson’s last days. Club favourite Ray Lewington was restored to first team duties (having been dumped into the academy by Hughes and his henchmen) and normal service resumed, as Jol set about replicating our 2008/09 assault on Europe.

We have had to do this the hard way, as Fair Play teams start from the very beginning of the Europa League. This leads to an element of roughing it and the chance of slipping on banana skins in faraway places, but so far so good. We’ve beaten NSI Runavik from the Faroe Islands 3-0 on aggregate (3-0 here, 0-0 there), Crusaders from Northern Ireland 7-1 (3-1 there, 4-0 here), and RNK Split 2-0 (0-0 there, 2-0 here). We now face Dnipro of Ukraine in the play-off round to reach the Europa League proper. In the background we’ve been unimpressive in friendlies, but you can’t have everything, can you?

What next then? Roy Hodgson was wonderful for Fulham but seemed to mistrust young players, so his legacy (via Hughes) is a good but old squad. Jol appears to have seen this quickly and has acted to improve the situation. Dan Burn from Darlington, Tom Donegan from Everton, Pajtim Kasami from Palermo and Marcel Gecov from Slovan Liberec are all much younger than our usual newcomers, and Jol has already featured the teenaged Matthew Briggs and Kerim ‘Barry’ Frei in the European games with impressive results. Hopefully he can blend experience and youth and continue the club’s upwards trajectory for a few seasons. John Arne Riise – our other ‘big’ signing – isn’t exactly one for the future, but we really did need a left back and he seems like a terrific catch. 

We are in need of another forward or two and at the moment it looks like Birmingham’s Cameron Jerome is on the radar. This wasn’t quite what we had in mind, but so far Jol’s transfer business has been carried out very much under the radar, so what happens next is anyone’s guess. The midfield seems well set (how will the club replace the evergreen Danny Murphy when he eventually hangs up his boots?) and while Jol wants pace out wide, we’re already well off for attacking midfield types, so there doesn’t seem to be much point in reinforcing this position. Equally, we have a good defence and two excellent goalkeepers. So Jol can take his time and pick up talent where he finds it, without having to force the issue. 

All of which adds up to another top half finish, we hope. People seem to have focused on 8th or 9th as realistic targets, and that seems fair, although we must remind ourselves not to take this Premier League lark for granted – better, richer clubs than us have struggled in the past. So 2011/12 will be another case of ensuring survival as soon as possible, then hopefully having some fun in Europe. Good times.

Richard Allen writes at http://cravencottagenewsround.wordpress.com. The Fulham Review, his annual review of last season is out now available for a fiver, and can be purchased from www.godsfoot.com. His first book, ‘When Football Was Football: Fulham’ is out in September. You can also follow him on twitter @richallenfulham