[themaclad]

Going well so far this season themaclad .... keep it up

Cheers Wereham, under the radar, although that does annoy me, as pundits make little reference to us but one defeat is not bad.

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Fulham 2 Preston North End 2

Fulham line-up: Button, Sessegnon, Odoi, McDonald ©, Kebano (Cairney, 46), Johansen (Mollo, 71), Fonte, Ayite, Ream, Norwood, Kalas. Subs not used: Bettinelli, Soares, Graham, Djalo, Cisse.

PNE line-up: Maxwell, Woods, Earl, Pearson (Welsh, 59), Huntington ©, Davies, Barkhuizen (Robinson, 71), Johnson, Hugill, Maguire (Harrop, 30), Browne. Subs not used: Hudson, Vermijl, Boyle, Mavididi.

Attendance: 18,435 (1,736 PNE fans)

This felt like a defeat, being seconds away from an extremely hard fought victory after going into a two goal lead at half time, in fairness to the home side, they put us under a bit of pressure in the second half, spent most of the last 15 minutes with everybody in the penalty area trying to keep them out and it was probably no surprise that they scored late on to give them a probably deserved point.
Two crucial events happened at half time Cairney was brought on and the influential Scot certainly made Fulham ticked couple this with the loss of both Barkuizen and Pearson gave Fulham the upper hand in the latter stages.
The only surprise in the opening 15 minutes was the lack of goals could have been 3 all, Maguire denied by a last ditch tackle had also dwelled on the ball far too long when well placed and Browne fired straight at keeper Button when well placed, whilst three Fulham efforts in the space of 15 seconds were kept out by North End with Maxwell pulling off a great save to deny Johansen, Fonte had also gone close.
What was noticeable was the home defence was a bit suspect in the first half and it was found missing in action when Maguire scooted down the left headed foir the box pass to Hugill one up. Seven minutes later it was two more poor defending, Barkuizen cut in from the right fired off a shot which clipped team mate Maguire and went in.
Fulham went close from a corner but a header for Fonte just went wide, North End also lost Maguire who pulled up injured, possible hamstring injury.
Oncme Cairney and the seige began, McDonald hit a post, think it was Huntington who cleared from the line, looked odds on Fulham reducing the deficit but we hung on in there and managed to get down the other end and had chances to wrap the game up but Harrop twice took ten touches too many and the chances were lost. With 16 minutes left the second seige of our goal was well under way when Woods brought down Fonte in the area, Norwood did the business from the spot. Hanging on for grim death defending so deep we were almost in teh Hammersmith seats. Basically down to 10 as Johnson was affected by cramp. Five minutes went up, in the sixth minute long hopeful ball into the box, out came Maxwell miles from goal failed to collect ball ran to Odoi snap shot and in it went.
A rather cheesed off walk back to the station probably not the only one who felt like that.
Always a good trip to Fulham and if you go the walk from Putney Bridge down the side of the river is just great, friendly club as well.

Preston boss Alex Neil: "Chris has come and collected so many crosses for us this season that have relieved pressure, and won us points, so I'm not going to be critical of him in terms of being an aggressive goalie, coming to try and help his team.

"Time was up. The fourth official showed me his watch. It was 95 minutes and it started going to 20 and 30 seconds and the referee allowed them to put another ball into the box.

"We hunted and pressed and grafted and ratted them all over the pitch and they couldn't deal with it.

"We need to have more quality in the final third. But I can't ever question commitment and work rate."

Fulham manager Slavisa Jokanovic: "They didn't surprise us, they are one of the best teams off the ball, we are one of the best teams on the ball.

"They put us under great pressure and after we made mistakes they could have scored more goals. We didn't find a solution for the physical part of the game.

"In the second half we connected with a few more passes and took more risks and I believe we deserved this point.

"We lost a few points at home in the last minute and today we won one in the last minute so we are satisfied."

Referee: Mr D England