Fulham v Charlton last Saturday was only my third game this season – Boro home & Pompey away being the other two in my lowest attendance in about 20 years – and we lost both of those, so at least a 0-0 draw was an improvement on that.
The day just brought home to me what so many other Fulham fans – and I suspect fans of football teams in the ‘middle third’ of the Premier League have been saying for some time – it can be a pretty santized yet highly expensive experience these days. I knew, like Charlton’s manager – or anybody else who watched us over the past few months – who would be playing give or take a couple of players. And apart from Goma, Steed and Van Der Sar they were all capable of a lot more than they showed.
Brian McBride must be wondering why he bothered coming to Fulham (apart from the money of course) and Moritz Volz must be wondering what he did wrong to be dropped. I watched Volz at the end of the game running round the pitch with a ball and the subs meeting up in the centre circle for a kick about afterwards shortly to be joined by Claus Jensen looking a bit too pleased with himself for my liking (terrific player but I suspect he’s been bitten with whatever lazy bug has infected most of the others too). I then totted up the expenses on the way out: 28 quid for a ticket, 3 quid for a programme, which is basically a bit of corporate marketing puff, 3 quid for a can of Tetleys on a windy day by the river (dumb, I know) and for what? To support the club I still feel a lot of personal attachment to despite them trying to squeeze the life out of it by making it all about the Brand and badge-kissing tosh. Oh well, thankfully I don’t face the decision of whether to go every game. Although now, bizarrely I have to decide whether Columbus in July is worth the trip as Fulham become the latest team to try and tap into the Yankee dollar reserves.
It seems as if Chris Coleman is basically frightened of making a mistake at this stage of the season and that has led to this inertia – his comments after the game about potentially losing 3-0 and getting sacked if he changed the formation proved that. I don’t get the impression he’s a great thinker and he hasnÂ’t exactly surrounded himself by people who would challenge him in that department either. Tigana was a stubborn git, but he at least taught the players to take risks (while making sure they were fit). Thank God Edwin stuck with us, which has enabled us to pursue this risk-averse boring strategy to its likely conclusion of a place slightly above the drop zone. But I hope this is the last season we play like that or I might struggle to come to even 3 games next season. And I never thought I’d say that.