I was unable to watch the game last night as I had to get up at 6 for work, good win for us glad to see Berbatov & Ruiz score again.
How did Boateng do yesterday? I see he played 90 mins
How was Richardson at LB?
Does Kasami look like making our 1st team squad this year?
Didn't watch it myself but all over twitter I have been seeing people singing Kasami's praises. A good guy to follow for everything Fulham on twitter and the pre season games is @Frankieyoutwit
Boateng was solid. great addition, just need a better partner for him in the middle.
Richardson was fine, some say the goal was his fault. but egnerally solid, better than the first game. i prefer him to riise, just hope he stays fit.
Kasami does look good, seems more agile than he was before. works very very hard aswell, making up for berbatov i suppose. he was behind berba, while ruiz was wide right.
The feed was stuttering a bit for me but i watched all of it. Boateng was impressive in the holding midfield position. he cut out plenty of channels down the middle. didn't notice any hard challenges despite his reputation as an enforcer.
Richardson was alright at left back. he challenged sidwell in the start for the most unnecessary challenges. Their goal was from a very nice chip... the responsibility being split between hughes and richardson as the player cut in from their right flank into the middle between them. Kieran pulled up and called for an offside flag that was never coming and Hughes recovered but badly.
Sidwell made some bad challenges early but settled his nerves later on. I imagine if this thread gets 20 more posts no one will mention his goal but it was a competent header between two defenders from Ruiz's corner.
Kasami is an interesting one lately. Dejagah started on the left and Ruiz on the right with Kasami in the hole + a bit of rotation between Kasami/Ruiz. hard to read into it too much. Dejagah only started at wide left once last term and that was in the 2-0 away loss to man city, though fairly often Jol would swap he and Duff throughout a match.
There was some very pretty passages involving kasami/dejagah/ruiz/berbatov up top, a lot of short little passes with everybody on the same page.
One of the real highlights was that it was nice to see Dejagah moving so fluidly again, even more so than the first friendly. Kacaniklic very cleverly won the penalty putting his body between the ball and the man making it pretty easy for the referee. Mesca and Karagounis didn't really have enough time to make an impact but no glaring errors either.
Quote from: zschwartz on July 18, 2013, 12:56:35 PM
Nice summary (i.e I agree with it)
Let me be the one to mention a fine headed goal by Steve 'Soars Like Eagle' Sidwell
Quote from: cmg on July 18, 2013, 01:06:35 PM
Quote from: zschwartz on July 18, 2013, 12:56:35 PM
Nice summary (i.e I agree with it)
Let me be the one to mention a fine headed goal by Steve 'Soars Like Eagle' Sidwell
Much better than screaming like an eagle they reckon :023:
Quote from: cmg on July 18, 2013, 01:06:35 PM
Quote from: zschwartz on July 18, 2013, 12:56:35 PM
Nice summary (i.e I agree with it)
Let me be the one to mention a fine headed goal by Steve 'Soars Like Eagle' Sidwell
haha, but it was a good header! he clearly looked rough around the edges defensively, mostly in the early stages. there's no need to go through the back of players like that in a friendly, particularly as concacaf is not a region unfamiliar with simulation.
Quote from: zschwartz on July 18, 2013, 12:56:35 PM
There was some very pretty passages involving kasami/dejagah/ruiz/berbatov up top, a lot of short little passes with everybody on the same page.
Now, that is interesting - Jol is trying a lineup that includes Ruiz and Kasami. Even more interesting, it might actually work?
Quote from: farfouille on July 18, 2013, 02:45:22 PM
Quote from: zschwartz on July 18, 2013, 12:56:35 PM
There was some very pretty passages involving kasami/dejagah/ruiz/berbatov up top, a lot of short little passes with everybody on the same page.
Now, that is interesting - Jol is trying a lineup that includes Ruiz and Kasami. Even more interesting, it might actually work?
with the quality of opposition it is hard to tell. boateng dropping back takes over almost all distribution duties that hangeland used to have (for reasons that are not particularly clear as we were often playing 2 defensive mids...) but maybe that will allow us to push slightly further up.
But Dejagah on the left takes the Riether combination away... might compliment Ruiz's touch and relatively slower speed, might not. Could strengthen us overall or strip away the one really effective channel. looking forward to game 3.
