can't believe this was 9 years ago....
Massed Gas in SW6
The winter sunshine was warm, the high tide filled the river, and Putney looked much lovelier than I remembered it. And seven thousand gas headed towards the cottage, the quaintly-named home of Fulham in a posh corner of London.
Inside, we were all in a new stand at one end of the pitch. It was functional and utilitarian, and a bit of a disappointment after the red-brick facades of the old stands. And it contrasted with a funny little stand in one corner that looked like it had been a cricket pavilion at a public school, redolent (like the red brick) of the days of Empire.
The gas masses were tightly-packed, loud and, though there was no menace, intimidating. The Fulham fans were sprinkled around the rest of the ground, quiet and docile. It was a funny sort of mix – all wrong, but a great time and place to be a Gashead.
We fielded Stevie Brilliant, Goal Machine Hinton, Lescott and JJ across the back, with a strange midfield of Big Game Sammy, Coles, Lines and Pipey. The midfield might be alright for the sort of defensive game that we’ll probably end up playing, I thought. In attack, there was Lambert in the hole and Willo running free at the front.
Fulham put out a wide range of nationalities and spellings. I’d heard of them from the telly, but didn’t really know them apart from ex-England Danny Mills, ex-Chelsea Smertin and the memorably-named Aunty Niemi in goal.
Rovers came out to a roar, and quickly settled into the game, looking comfortable on the ball and looking to create possibilities. We had a throw-in about level with the penalty area, it got flicked on and suddenly Coles pokes it in the back of the net. Oh my golly, there’s 3 minutes gone and we’re one-nil up. We all jump around, the game re-starts, and I start looking at my watch and thinking about 87 minutes of worrying. Stupid.
Fulham came back fairly quickly, with their captain seeming to fancy his chances in a heading contest with Steve Elliot. Strange strategy, I thought. But it stayed fairly even until Fulham put together a sustained period of pressure after about 20 minutes. One shot missed Phillips’ post by an inch, another flashed across him, but Rovers were dogged, kept good shape, and it looked like we were going to hold out to half-time.
We were also lively at the front, with some good balls going to Willo, often from Lambo, but his first touch wasn’t really up to scratch. Its hard to be too critical – a month ago we were asking him to look like a League 1 striker, but today we wanted him with Premiership touch. He looked quick and busy, though, and earned his keep. Sammy also had a good half, running his little socks off and putting in some good tackles.
Fulham only really had one tactic – spreading the ball fast and wide, and then making interesting movements as the ball was passed across the front of the Rovers box. They were good at it, too, and eventually some good heading bounced across the middle and Healey poked in an equaliser. Probably deserved, but he was a small and not-particularly-pleasant looking man, and I would have preferred it to have been someone else.
Both teams trogged off at half-time with honours even, though the Gasheads roared their opinion as Rovers went off.
Second half started much as the first had finished, before, after about 10 minutes, Rovers had their best period of the game and started to build some pressure. A free-kick on the right was met with more thunderous applause from the Gasheads, though I thought we’d miss Captain Campbell on the delivery. Wrong again – Lines delivered it perfectly onto Goal Machine Hinton’s bonce, and a textbook glancing header had a clear path to the back of the net. Pandemonium!
The Gasheads just got louder, every Rovers success and Fulham mistake was met with roars, but Fulham found more and more space as the Rovers tired. The Fulham tactic looked just like the one’s most teams use against ten men – spreading it fast and wide – but Rovers continued to harry and keep their shape. Fulham put lots of balls to their number 7 on the right, but Aaron did well, and was backed up by CC who had come on for Igloo.
Fulham were skilful, but they also pushed and prodded a lot. Rovers, by contrast, put in some immaculately timed tackles, which were bone-crushing nonetheless. JJ got booked for one that was less well-timed, but the physically tiny ref generally did pretty well with a lot of marginal decisions. With half-an-hour left, Fulham clearly weren’t happy with the pattern of the game and brought on their subs.
Eventually, Mills pulled a super shot out of nowhere – pinpoint for accuracy and full of power – that Phillips got a hand on but only to deflect it into the net. It was 2-2 with about 15 minutes to play, and all sides of the ground got nervous. Rovers defended a lot, but also created a handful of chances, with Riggy coming on for a tiring Williams and looking very impressive too. He looked less willowy than in the past, and all the better for it.
Lots to be happy about at the final whistle, but it took quite a while to get us all out of there. I heard Danny Mills on the radio saying that they were disappointed not to win after all the chances they’d had in the second half. I thought that was hard on Rovers, who worked and worked and played some good football at times. Elliot, Lambert, Pipe and Coles all had excellent games, I thought, as did Phillips in goal. I like him – he knows how to communicate with the crowd.
Unlike against Wet Spam earlier this year, we weren’t outclassed and we earned our replay on Tuesday week. Fulham won’t be looking forward to it, that’s for sure.
