Before The Whistle: Fulham v Southampton

Written by Drew Heatley on 20th December 2024

As the saying goes: once bitten by Wolves, twice shy against the Saints. Or something like that.

That is to say that Marco Silva has drilled into the boys that a repeat of that performance against Southampton on Sunday won’t be accepted. The Saints arrive at Craven Cottage bottom of the Premier League and having dismissed manager Russell Martin.

If reports are to be believed, former Roma boss Ivan Juric is poised to replace him, but he’ll certainly not be in the dugout for this one.

The Whites continue to juggle injuries and suspensions as the festive period picks up pace. The big blow this week is that Kenny Tete will be out for up to 10 weeks following his collision with Joe Gomez at Anfield last week. Lucky we have Timothy Castagne to slot in, but we’ll be wary of the Belgian picking up any knocks of his own.

Andreas Pereira came in for Emile Smith Rowe in the 10 against Liverpool and immediately scored. But he’ll not get the chance to build on that, as he’s suspended for this one. As mentioned on the pod, this is the exact game ESR can sink his teeth into – let’s hope he’s hungry.

We’re all buoyed by the fact that Joachim Andersen returns from injury, and with Calvin Bassey back from suspension. It’ll be interesting to see what combination starts on Sunday, with Issa Diop impressing during Joa’s absence.

An interesting game in store, then. A win would take us to within three points of 30 before we’ve even tucked into our Christmas dinner, making it comfortably our best return from 17 games. That really would meant the sky is the limit this season. You Whites.