Our Focus turns to Saturday’s 3pm kickoff against Lee Johnson’s Bristol City side. It might be the Festive season but Johnson has proved time and time again that there’s no room for sentiment in football and certainly no chance of gifting us three points! The Fulham fan has come out victorious in his last four visits to the Cottage and the Robins go into this one full of confidence after a 5-2 victory over Huddersfield last time out.
City find themselves floating around the play-off places going into the new year, whilst it also feels like deja vu for Fulham who now look solid in third place. Despite four wins on the trot, we are still no closer to the top two who keep winning! Anyone else smelling a Cardiff? Too early, for the love of Christmas, not again!
Head To Head
- Fulham Wins 21 | Draws 15 | Bristol C Wins 25.
- Fulham have lost the last 4 meetings at the Cottage with the Robins.
- Bobby Reid scoring against us in the most recent defeat in 2017.
- Our last win against them at home was in December 1997, Paul Moody with the winner in a 1-0 win.
- Bristol City have won 4 of the last 6 matches against us.
- Fulham have only scored 3 goals at home to City in the last 5 meetings.
Bristol City in 2019/20
- League Position: 5th.
- League Form: WLDWD.
- Average Possession: 48.5%.
- Top Scorers: A.Weimann (7), F.Diédhiou (5).
- Form Table (Last 6 Matches): 11th (9pts)
- Clean sheets: 5.
- Discipline: 30 Yellows | 1 Red.
- Both teams have scored in 13 of their 19 league matches.
Players in Common
Joe Bryan
Fulham: 48 apps, 2 goals (2018-present).
Bristol City: 230 apps, 20 goals (2011-2018).
Pat Beasley, Roy Bentley, Kevin Betsy, Matthew Briggs, Joe Bryan, Andy Cole, Joe Connor, Mark Cooper, Sean Davis, Liam Fontaine, Ryan Fredericks, Adam Green, Tomas Kalas, Rodney Mcaree, Leroy Rosenior, Liam Rosenior, Nicky Shorey, Matt Smith, Tony Thorpe & Cauley Woodrow, Bobby Decordova-Reid.
Alex’s View (@AHillier21)
After four consecutive wins in the league following the disaster against Hull, we suddenly find ourselves in third and looking towards the top two as opposed to holding onto a place in the playoffs. Clearly, the points difference is nowhere near big enough for us to become complacent about our place in the league but if you can’t celebrate our form now what can you do?
In that run, Kamara has displaced Knockaert and provided both goals and assists while creating space for Mitro, Cavaleiro and Bobby Reid to exploit. The adjustment of moving Stefan Johansen further back in midfield has been a revelation and given Cairney greater freedom to move up the pitch. However, the biggest difference has been a consistent run in the side for Marek Rodak, whose performances have masked some defensive frailty to propel us up the table. Bristol City will provide a significant challenge as we continue our run against sides in promotion contention but given that the game is at home we have to be looking to make it five on the bounce.
With games against Preston, Brentford and Leeds to come, a victory on Saturday could give the team the confidence to really push on and put pressure on the top two.