Player Ratings: Fulham 1-2 Chelsea

Once again, Fulham showed their frailties, conceding two late goals in the SW6 derby to take us to 25 dropped points for the season from winning positions. After an impressive first half played at a great tempo, Silva’s side retreated and retreated until eventually Tyrique George equalised. At that point, Pedro Neto’s stoppage time winner almost felt inevitable considering how frequently Fulham have shown a weak mentality this season.

Bernd Leno

Made a number of decent saves and rarely parried them away into dangerous areas, which felt especially important in helping waste time pre-Chelsea’s equaliser. One save in particular early on in the second half from Pedro Neto was particularly impressive from such close range. Still have certain doubts about how slowly he distributes, it costs us the opportunity to counter attack on so many occasions. Hard to suggest that he could have reached either Chelsea goal late on. 6/10.

Kenny Tete

I think the step-up in quality from Castagne at both ends of the pitch across the game was quite obvious to see. Where Castagne rarely pushes past his winger in offensive areas, Tete got multiple shots away and created a good relationship with Sess from the off on the right wing. Probably says a lot to that Pedro Neto got most of his joy in the final 10-15 minutes when Tete came off. Prior to that, Tete’s eight clearances was the most of any Fulham player, and his one-to-one defending abilities looked as strong as ever on his return from injury. 7/10.

Joachim Andersen

Thought for the majority of the game the Dane defended our box really well in the air, clearing almost everything that came into our area. He kept pace well with Jackson when Chelsea went over the top and denied him any opportunities to get shots away in dangerous situations. His long diagonals were on and off throughout, as they often have been this season. 6.5/10.

Calvin Bassey

Felt at times that some of his best attributes went against him on the day. His enthusiasm to bring the ball out of defence cost us possession on a number of occasions and resulted in him being booked. A couple of times too he lost the ball in the defensive third which nearly led to Chelsea chances. Not a disaster of a performance, but poor for his standards that he’s set this season. 5.5/10.

Antonee Robinson

Seemingly struggling with his final ball again recently. Admittedly a symptom of his game in the past that had caused much frustration within the fanbase, but this season it felt like we’d seen the back of it with his ten Premier League assists. Marked Madueke out of the game well, but struggled a bit more with Neto and Sancho switching wings and cutting inside in the second half. Also, worth noting that as captain, he doesn’t appear to be offering huge leadership qualities in games when Fulham need to hold onto vital points. 5/10.

Sander Berge

Solid as per usual in the middle of the park. For all his words pre-game about needing to show bravery in such a big game, it’s still frustrating to see him not take much initiative on the ball and play the safe pass more often than not in the opposition’s half. 100% pass accuracy on paper looks good, but it’s easy to complete every pass if it’s played five yards to the side. As good as he is, and as strong as he is against a press, he has ball-playing and progressive abilities we need to see more often in these games. 6/10.

Sasa Lukic

For me this was an improvement on recent weeks in which he’d looked off the pace and erratic in the tackle since returning from suspension. Lukic was taking the initiative to run beyond Chelsea’s midfield and take up good positions in the final third. With Berge evidently the sitting number six in this system, it’s something the Serb needs to do more often. A number of well-timed tackles in the midfield helped us in transition whilst he was on the pitch, especially in a game that was so high-intensity in the first half. 7/10.

Ryan Sessegnon

In a high-tempo local derby, it was our enthusiastic homegrown man who was emblematic of everything good Fulham did in the first half and in moments in the second half. He made more successful tackles than any player on the pitch and used the ball really well from it, running at Chelsea’s defence with real intent. It was these qualities that led to the Fulham goal, winning the ball in the Chelsea half and setting up Iwobi to score. Sess showed that he knew what this game meant to the fans and set an example for others to follow, both with his attacking play an d the way he tracked back to support Tete. It’s no surprise to me that we capitulated after he came off. 8/10 – Man of the Match.

Andreas Pereira

Another that helped to set the tone throughout, Pereira’s pressing intensity was superb throughout and caused Chelsea’s defence to struggle on the ball especially in the first half. The issue was mostly with his final ball. There’s this persisting issue with his set pieces for one and his constant struggles beating the first man from corners. To put in nine crosses and only two of them reach their man is incredibly frustrating too. 6.5/10.

Alex Iwobi

Iwobi’s goal was a superb finish, clinically placed into the bottom corner. Hilariously, that finish was in contrast to most of his first half performance, where his final ball and final third decision making was generally really poor and cost us momentum multiple times. Too often in the second half when Fulham could have pushed for a second, Iwobi slowed play down and didn’t take the initiative that he may have pre-Christmas. 6/10.

Raul Jimenez

Was really impressed with Raul’s hold-up play in the first half, normally a part of his game in which I don’t feel he quite compares to Muniz. The number of times in the first half that he took a bouncing ball out of the sky and moved it onto his teammates was phenomenal. Unfortunately, his influence on the game in the second half completely dwindled as he looked to have run out of steam. 6.5/10.

Substitutes

Tom Cairney (72’ for Lukic)

Didn’t quite seem to get up with the speed of play quickly enough. Struggled to get his foot on the ball and create anything when Fulham were put onto the back foot in the final 15 minutes and was too weak and slow in challenging Palmer for the ball in the build up to Chelsea’s winner. 5.5/10.

Timothy Castagne (78’ for Tete)

Felt like you could see the knock-down in quality when he came on for Tete. We offered less of a threat on the right hand side going forward and Chelsea got more joy offensively on their left. Too slow sliding in to block George’s equaliser too. 5/10.

Harry Wilson (78’ for Sessegnon)

Granted, you have to ease a player in who’s been injured for a number of months, but the effort Wilson showed to make forward runs and push Chelsea’s backline back would’ve been handy to have earlier on so that the whole Fulham XI didn’t constantly look to retreat as the game went on. 6.5/10.

Adama Traore and Carlos Vinicius (85’ for Alex Iwobi and Raul Jimenez) on too late to be fairly rated.

Manager

Marco Silva

I just don’t get how the same problems continue to persist this season with no change. He’s not stupid, he’s taken us so far to prove his integrity as a coach, but the same frailties in his management style remain. Poor subs, struggles with mentality and stubbornness continue to show their ugly head. Bringing Cairney on for Lukic instead of Reed lost us a lot of control in the middle. Taking off Sessegnon led to us struggling for intensity and lost us a man that would track back. 25 points lost from winning positions is borderline unacceptable and the fact the same panicky defending and lack of leadership kick in every single time are emblematic of things not changing despite being clear for everyone to see the issues at hand. If he’s not willing to make changes to his leadership style and adapt the way his side deals with game management, these same issues will persist and it will create worries that he simply doesn’t know how to change it, despite us being in so many promising positions, both in individual games, and in league position and cup run scenarios. Ridiculously frustrating, especially considering how well we were set up both tactically and in our intensity in the first half. 3.5/10.