Fulham’s best moments of 2024
Written by
George Rossiter
on
1st January 2025
As an exciting 2025 approaches, George Rossiter reflects on the best Fulham moments of 2024, including some special derby wins, last minute drama and a couple of emotional returns.
7. Poacher’s purple patches
For half a decade, Fulham sides under Jokanovic, Parker and Silva could rely on the goalscoring abilities of Aleksandar Mitrovic, but we entered 2024 still searching for solutions following Mitro’s summer 2023 departure. Raul Jimenez was continuing to struggle at the club, and Rodrigo Muniz was still an unknown at Premier League level. In 2024, however, both would go through spells of form that would not only excite the fanbase, but pay back the faith shown in them by Marco Silva to be our options in the Premier League.
Going into February, Muniz was yet to open his account in the Premier League. Within a few months, he was an emotional and proud winner of a Premier League Player of the Month award and ended the 2023/24 season as Fulham’s top scorer, with nine in the Premier League and 10 in all competitions, including braces against Tottenham and Bournemouth. Raul’s return to goalscoring form in the Premier League has been equally heartwarming. His last Wolves goal had come midway through the 2021/22 season, with the Mexican spending multiple years struggling to rediscover the form he’d been in prior to his nasty head injury sustained in a duel with David Luiz. However, Marco Silva’s faith in the forward has paid off. Jimenez scored nine goals throughout the calendar year, including important goals in wins against Newcastle and Forest. Those goals have made him Mexico’s all-time top scorer in the Premier League, a wonderful accolade.
6. Semi-final pride
The club contested it’s first-ever League Cup semi-final in January – and boy did we give it a go as big underdogs. The Whites led the first leg at Anfield at half time following an early Willian strike. Unfortunately, despite a brilliant performance, Liverpool scored twice in quick succession to win the game, as they previously had done in the league fixture at Anfield. Despite those goals from Curtis Jones and Cody Gakpo, Fulham went back to the Cottage just one goal behind and with their dreams of a Wembley final still alive.
What an occasion that second leg was at the Cottage. The Hammersmith End was a true sight to behold with displays and fire going off in front of the home fans, making it clear that this was a real spectacle and potentially a special night in the club’s history. While Liverpool took an early lead through Diaz, Issa Diop gave Fulham hope by bringing the aggregate score back to 2-3 with a quarter of an hour to play.
Liverpool would eventually prevail and beat Chelsea at Wembley. However, the pride of reaching that stage of the competition and taking on the mighty Liverpool over 180 minutes in such an amazing occasion filled our fans with nothing but pride and ultimately an ambition that one day in the near future, under Marco Silva, we can go that extra step further.
5. Ange annihilated at the Cottage
Ange Postecoglu had gained many admirers since his move to the Premier League to manage Tottenham Hotspur. His side were top of the league after 10 games, and though they’d slipped away from those lofty heights by the time they arrived at the Cottage in March, their style of football had received praise from many in the media. Fulham were coming off the back of a poor performance in a defeat at Molineux and were the underdogs in this one.
This was a proper one-sided game, but not in the way people may have expected. Fulham started like a house on fire and were comfortably the better team, but for a while it felt like a game where the Whites would reflect on missed opportunities. That was until the in-form Muniz opened the scoring just before half-time. Another two followed, first from Sasa Lukic, then Muniz again, within 15 minutes of the restart, with Tottenham resorting to damage limitation against Marco Silva’s side. After multiple good performances against the typical ‘top six’ that hadn’t warranted the results they deserved, this game on top of a New Years’ Eve win over Arsenal were a sign of our ability to compete with the best in the country.
4. Exciting summer arrivals (and returns)
The summer transfer window was one of the most exciting in this club’s recent history. With the departures of Mitro and then Joao Palhinha in the two most recent summer windows, the money was there to be spent and there was scope to make some really exciting moves, and boy did Fulham deliver. None more so than when the club smashed the previous transfer record by signing England international Emile Smith Rowe for north of £30m. Reiss Nelson followed from Arsenal on loan in a deadline-day deal that went right down to the wire.
As well as the two Arsenal boys who came with a tonne of pedigree behind them, there were some emotional returns to Craven Cottage, too. Joachim Andersen came back to the club, this time on a permanent deal from Crystal Palace, for a large fee. Andersen was already a fan favourite following his brilliant displays under Scott Parker and fans were delighted to see him return.
The most exciting and heartwarming signing though, had to be that of Ryan Sessegnon. Fulham’s potentially most loved academy graduate of this century, returned to the place he knows as home following the expiration of his contract of Tottenham. Add to those four signings the arrivals of Sander Berge and Jorge Cuenca, plus the development of Josh King graduating to the first team fold, and the feel good factor was glowing around Motspur Park going into the new season.
3. Theatre of Iwobi’s dreams
When Fulham went to Old Trafford in February, revenge was on the mind. A year earlier, it was the scene of what would become an infamous FA Cup quarter-final between the two sides. Fulham had played United off the park but came undone after red cards for Mitrovic, Willian and Marco Silva in an incredible turn of events, which ended up with Man United progressing to the semi-finals as the Whites ultimately fell apart.
Fulham were once again the better side in this league fixture, playing by far the better football against Ten Hag’s side, who’s form had been ropey all season. With just over an hour on the clock, Calvin Bassey gave the Whites a deserved lead. Fulham continued to play with confidence, looking to see out a famous win, until Harry Maguire turned home from close range in the 90th minute, breaking the hearts of everyone in the away end.
When a lengthy amount of stoppage time was added on, Fulham’s fans feared the worse, we’d been here before with Man United and it never ended well. Suddenly, Adama Traore had burst forward over half of the length of the Old Trafford pitch, finding Alex Iwobi in the penalty area. The Nigerian slotted home in the 97th minute, sending the away end into delirium and putting to bed most of the pain from the previous season’s nightmare.
2. Wilson’s derby delight
Fulham came into the first West London derby of the season in a rather pessimistic mood. Not only was there the worries that come with a derby game against our newest ‘rivals’ from Hounslow, but Fulham didn’t find themselves in the best form. Despite outplaying the champions at the Etihad, Fulham had fallen to defeat against Man City. Another defeat followed at the hands of Aston Villa, before a last-minute Beto equaliser denied the Whites all three points at Goodison Park. Optimism amongst Fulham fans for such a big fixture was dwindling in the build-up to this one.
Those fears came to life in the game. Fulham just did not get going and when Vitaly Janelt scored a screamer from range to put the bus stop side in the lead, it felt like it was going to be a painful evening at the Cottage. As the minutes ticked down, Fulham improved but to no avail. Then up stepped Harry Wilson. In the 92nd minute, the Welsh Wizard looks to backheel a volleyed effort from a cross, and though it appeared to come off the shin, it did enough to loop over Flekken (and win Premier League goal of the month).
The joy did not end there. In the 97th minute, Wilson heads home, thi stime from a cross from the left. While the ball almost seemed to move in slow motion towards the corner of the net, the roof coming off the Hammersmith End happened instantaneously. One of the most memorable moments in the history of our grand old stadium.
1. Blues beaten at the Bridge (finally!)
When I was growing up, despite the rivalry with QPR, despite the emerging derbies with Brentford, despite the historical hatred of Gillingham, Chelsea was the club to despise. There was just one issue: they were also the team I grew up seeing us lose over and over to. Even when we weren’t beaten, it still felt gutting coming away from a Fulham-Chelsea fixture. Take Dempsey’s Valentine’s Day penalty miss in stoppage time, for example. Though Carlos Vinicius may have ended a long wait for a win over the Blues not so long ago, it was 1979 the last time Fulham won at Stamford Bridge in a game of any sort of magnitude.
After 45 years of dreaming of a win at the Bridge, finally, this Fulham side delivered one. Cole Palmer’s genius prevailed in a fairly equal first half of football, and let’s not forget that this is no joke of a Chelsea side, at the time of the game they were comfortably Liverpool’s biggest title threat.
Just like against Brentford, Fulham grew and grew into the game, but as the game came to a close, it seemed like another frustrating derby day. Then up stepped Harry Wilson… a familiar tale. The Welshman once again headed home a crucial derby goal to equalise after Antonee Robinson’s cross was headed back across goal by Timothy Castagne into Wilson’s path.
What happened at that same end of the pitch not five minutes later will remain in Fulham folklore until the end of time. Sasa Lukic bombed down the right hand side on the counter, finds the perfect pass for Rodrigo Muniz in the penalty area. With 95 minutes on the clock, the popular young Brazilian produces a composed finish beyond his years, sending the away fans present at Stamford Bridge into a mix of a frenzy, disbelief and genuine tears. Greatest moment of 2024? Without a doubt. It’s probably as good as anything we’ve seen from a Fulham team since the days of Roy Hodgson.
