Fulham’s on the home straight in our marathon push for Europe

As the season draws to a close, Elizabeth Barnard says it doesn’t matter how we get points on the board – so long as they go on there. 

It was the London marathon this weekend, a race I’ve always been absolutely fascinated by (my dad was a prolific and speedy marathon-runner, clearly the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree). I love watching it, and I love watching how people finish – some barely able to stand, some beaming and waving. It never really matters though – the achievement is enough.

From one arduous and exhausting sporting event to another… watching Fulham play away at Southampton. On Saturday, Fulham traveled to a team that have had more managers than league wins this season and are historically atrocious: the joint-worst team in Premier League history. It’s been almost laughably easy for so many teams at St Mary’s this season. Any sensible or neutral observer would have predicted a handsome Fulham win in this fixture – but not our fans.

And, it almost doesn’t go our way, once again. Jack Stephens opens the scoring – his first goal this season – in a needlessly given-away free kick. He’s assisted by Ryan Manning – it’s also Manning’s first goal involvement this season. Fulham are shambolic and embarrassing in that first half – it’s a mirror image of poor performances against Wolves, Southampton, and Ipswich.

But there’s always hope – after all, Southampton have a habit of gifting their opponents goals. And, so it proves; Marco Silva’s substitutions change the game, and a Jan Bednarek deflection wrongfoots keeper Aaron Ramsdale on Emile Smith Rowe’s shot (Fulham’s first shot on target, I believe). 1-1. To take only two points off the Saints this season would still be an appalling return, so Fulham push.

The emotion of a 92nd-minute winner from your academy graduate shouldn’t be dampened by dull tactical analysis – so I won’t try that. For much of the day, I was grateful not to be in the away end, but when that goal went in I craved it. One of our own stooped to direct a header past floundering goalkeeper Ramsdale – of course it was magical. Ryan Sessegnon’s goals always are.

As the dust began to settle, the questions began to be asked – did it really need to get to that point? Of course it didn’t. But, more than that – does it matter how we performed on Saturday, or is picking up the three points the only important thing? Ask me this question two months ago, and I would have insisted our performances matter – we need to string together some consistency, and any better team would have punished our first half performance ruthlessly. 

So it’s proved for other teams chasing glory. Take a look at Arsenal in 2022/23, the first season where they seriously challenged for the title under Mikel Arteta. They needed emotional late winners in poor performances against Bournemouth and Villa in the late winter to keep a chasing Manchester City at bay, but that caught up with them eventually, and in the spring they crashed out of the title race. Sheffield United’s 2024/25 season has been similar – throughout the season they were picking up scrappy wins which weren’t backed up by performances, and it caught up with them, meaning they dramatically missed out on automatic promotion.

But, the end of the season is so close now. We’ve got four games left. Four massive finals against Aston Villa, Everton, Brentford, and Manchester City. Like all Fulham fans, I desperately want that eighth place finish which is (hopefully) a European spot. I don’t mind how the goals go in anymore – I’d take a smash and grab in any of them. 

Fulham have been wildly inconsistent this season in both performances and results, and at times it’s been a challenging watch – but now, we’re riding on something more than form. The emotion of Saturday, whatever that inspires, can hopefully push us to more results, even if they come from dubious penalties or goals off our centre-backs’ bums. I don’t care how we get there, but I am desperate for us to be in Kazakhstan next year.

The Premier League season is a marathon. It’s time for that final push to get us over the line.