Fulham v Brighton: The Cottagers view with Fulham Focus

The 2020-21 Premier League season may be only 12 games old, but anyone with a focus on Fulham v Brighton will know that Wednesday night’s meeting at Craven Cottage is very much a relegation six pointer.

Fulham endured a slow start to the campaign on their return to the top flight after a year away. Scott Parker’s side have started to find their feet in recent weeks however, recording a number of impressive results including victory at Leicester City and holding champions Liverpool to a draw.

Brighton meanwhile seem to be going in the opposite direction. A promising start has given way to the grim realisation that unless the Albion can find a way to actually win games, then another long, hard slog against relegation is on the cards.

If Graham Potter can mastermind a win at the Cottage, then the pressure on the Seagulls will ease a little. Should Brighton lose to Fulham, then the Cottagers will leapfrog them in the table and Twitter will probably be a place best avoided from around 10pm.

Ahead of Fulham v Brighton, we caught up with Matthew Wiggins from Fulham Focus. On the agenda were the relegation battle (obviously), the challenges of winning promotion at the end of an elongated season impacted hugely by Covid. and a certain Anthony Knockaert.

Fulham are back in the Premier League. How are you finding your return to the top flight and what are your aims for this season?
It’s good to be back, but it’s been a tough start and I think we knew it wasn’t going to be easy. We’re starting to look like a Premier League side now, and are really competing in games. The aim for us is to stay up and build on that I think and hopefully become an established Premier League team once again.

There was not much preparation time given the short ‘summer’ you had been between winning the Championship play off final and kicking off the 2020-21 season. Has that had an impact on Fulham’s season?
Obviously it wasn’t ideal but there wasn’t much we could do. More time would’ve helped a bit I think but I think we were always going to struggle at the start of the season as we tried to find our feet in the league.

We knew we needed reinforcements in the transfer market, and with the small time frame, it didn’t give us much of a chance to integrate the new signings.

Fulham chopped and changed managers a lot last time in the top flight. Do you think Scott Parker will see out the campaign regardless of where you finish?
Certainly after recent performances I’d like us to stick with Parker if we can maintain this until the end of the season. However at the start there were a lot of fans who wanted him gone with poor results and performances.

We’ve gone wrong by sacking managers too quickly in the past and I’m hoping the board learn from that but only time will tell.

What are this Fulham team’s strengths and weaknesses?
We’ve certainly got a lot of pace in our teams, with both wings having quick full backs and wingers so I think Brighton will need to be careful of that.

In recent weeks our counter attack has been particularly strong and some of that has been started by André-Frank Zambo Anguissa in the midfield with his powerful runs forward.

I would say our main weakness is finishing. We’ve had games such as Liverpool at home where the chances were there to put away, but we couldn’t quite finish them off. This includes penalties as well, and with so many missed, I always get a bit sceptical if we’re awarded a penalty.

Which Fulham player will Brighton need to be wary of, other than Aleksandar Mitrović who always seems to score against us?
Ademola Lookman has been a key man this season. His pace and quick feet make him unpredictable and he has the ability to get past defenders so easily. His quality finishing along with Bobby Decordova-Reid’s make them tough opposition for Brighton.

Brighton and Fulham have enjoyed some entertaining clashes in recent years. What have been your favourite matches against the Albion?
Personally, my favourite was at the Amex when we won 2-1 in our first season in the Championship in 2014-15. Darren Bent had just signed for Brighton, scored and then cupped his ears to the Fulham fans so it was nice for it to backfire on him and us to have the last laugh.

We have to talk about Anthony Knockaert. How is he viewed by Fulham fans and why didn’t he get a chance in the Premier League with you?
You can’t fault the work rate of Anthony Knockaert‘s that’s for sure. You’d often see him back in defence helping out and trying to get us into attack.

However, going forward was where he was frustrating. It was very predictable that he was going to cut in from the right onto his left foot and try and have a shot. Annoyingly, most of them would sail over the bar and into the stand.

I feel sorry for him that he didn’t get the chance in the Premier League, but with the form at the end of last season from Neeskens Kebano and the addition of Ademola Lookman, his chances were looking limited and it was probably best for him to head out on loan.

He’s definitely a good Championship player but I’m not sure he’d have cut it this season in the Premier League but I would’ve been happy to have been proved wrong.

Based on what you have seen so far this season, who is finishing in the top four and who is going down?
The top is looking very close at the moment, and I’d love to see a surprise in there come the end of the season, however I think it’ll be the usual suspects come May. I’ll go with Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur.

The bottom is a little bit spread out, but with us discovering a little bit of form and Burnley picking up a result at Arsenal, I can see some teams being dragged into it.

Arsenal and Leeds are by no means out of the woods, but I think they’ll be safe after 38 games. I’ll go with Sheffield United, West Bromwich Albion and Brighton – sorry! – with Fulham to scrape survival in the last few games.

Finally, what is the Fulham Focus prediction for Brighton v Fulham on Wednesday night?
We will be taking tremendous confidence into this game after Liverpool at home, where we put in our best performance of the season on the same day that Brighton were losing at Leicester. I’m going with 2-1 Fulham with Lookman and Decordova-Reid to score for us and Neal Maupay to score for Brighton.

Thanks to Matt for answering our questions. You can read up on Fulham before Brighton make the trip to Craven Cottage on Fulham Focus and do not forget to give them a follow on Twitter either.