It's Round and It's White
Fulham went to Upton Park on Saturday and were beaten pretty well by West Ham 3-0 in their first London derby of the season. This was a match that new West Ham player Andy Carroll had so much influence in without even scoring a goal. Unfortunately, Fulham could not handle the West Ham striker, and he was a huge part of the victory for his team.
West Ham took control in the very first minute as a long ball pass to Carroll was headed to Ricardo Vaz Te, who passed it to Kevin Nolan, and he scored the first goal of the match. This was a terrible way to start the match as it really set the tone for the first half.
The lead doubled in the 29th minute, as a corner a corner kick from Matthew Taylor led to the header by Winston Reid which got by Fulham goakleeper Mark Schwarzer to increase the lead to 2-0 for West Ham. Fulham were really struggling in this match at this point.
To make it even worse Taylor scored a goal in the 41st minute to give West Ham the eventual halftime lead of 3-0. The long balls, and the play of Carroll gave the Fulham defenders fits, and were a huge part of the halftime lead for West Ham.
The second half honestly I thought Fulham played much better, and Dimitar Berbatov came in to begin the half as he was an influence from the very beginning. It didn’t take long to see his ability and class as a player.
You could really see Berbatov’s influence in the second half. Also Fulham were really close to scoring a goal late in the match. Hugo Rodallega hit the post in the 88th minute, and it just was not meant to be for Fulham as they went down 3-0 to West Ham.
This was a bad loss for Fulham, but there is absolutely no reason to panic for Fulham fans. West Ham lost the week before 3-0 to Swansea, and looked horrible. They bounced back very nicely against Fulham.
I do think the loss of not having creative players like Bryan Ruiz and Kerim Frei hurt the club a great deal in this match. Also, Fulham manager Martin Jol didn’t bring Berbatov in until the second half, and also brought on Alex Kacaniklic midway through the half as well.
One bad loss does not mean that the season is headed in a negative way. Let’s see how Fulham play in their next match, and the upcoming games instead of overreacting negatively to a thrashing at Upton Park.
