EPL

Silva grateful Fulham's dominance was rewarded with late win

By Sports Desk November 04, 2024

Marco Silva believes Fulham claimed a "deserved win" against Brentford, though admits they should have secured the three points much earlier in their 2-1 victory.

It looked like Vitaly Janelt's 24th-minute strike against the run of play was going to wrap up all three points for Brentford, but Harry Wilson proved the Cottagers' hero off the bench, scoring twice in stoppage time to snatch the three points.

Fulham had dominated from the first whistle and had 26 shots, 12 of which were on target, though they struggled to find a way past their opponents' staunch defence until the 92nd minute.

Wilson became just the sixth player to score an equalising and match-winning goal from the 90th minute onwards in the Premier League, while his second goal was Fulham's latest-ever Premier League winner at 96:46.

Silva was delighted with how his team pushed until the final seconds to ensure they came away with a win.

"It was definitely a deserved win. We started on the front foot and dominated all the game. In the first 20 minutes, we had two clear chances to score," Silva told BBC Sport.

"After they scored, we didn't lose the confidence and the trust in ourselves, we kept pushing them back, and we created enough to not be losing at half-time.

"I told the players this is football, it can happen, but we have to keep pushing, working hard and playing our way.

"It was late, it should've been much before, but that's football."

 

Brentford, meanwhile, have now dropped a league-high 14 points from winning positions in the Premier League as they suffered a fifth consecutive away defeat in the competition.

In fact, they are the first side in the competition's history to score the first goal in four consecutive away games and lose all four.

They had defended resolutely until their late lapse in concentration, and even had a chance to win it, only for Bernd Leno's impressive save to keep out Fabio Carvalho in the 95th minute.

Thomas Frank, though, admitted he was not yet ready to take the positives from the performance after the disappointment of their late defeat.

"It was tough. It is emotionally very tough right now," Frank told Sky Sports.

"When you are leading in the 92nd minute, and you lose, it is tough. I don't think we hit our highest level. I think on the day Fulham were better.

"There was a lot of good defending and effort, and I thought that would have given us the win. We could have won it with the chance for Fabio Carvalho and then we lost.

"When we look at the game back, and we are more cool-headed, we will probably be very happy with the defensive standard. I thought there were unbelievable blocks, and recovery runs and all that we did well. On the ball, we didn't do enough."

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    Neuer, who was sent off against Leverkusen, has an issue with his ribs, while Vincent Kompany did not specify Gnabry's injury.

    "Manuel Neuer has discomfort with his ribs. It also looks like Serge Gnabry won't be involved either. Aleksandar Pavlovic is available," Kompany told reporters.

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    "Things are looking good. I don't want to give a timeline and put our medical team under pressure. It could well be that he plays again this year. But everything needs to go perfectly," Kompany said of Kane.

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    "They're playing in Europe. It's always tough to be competitive in both competitions. What Heidenheim have done over the last 20 years is good," Kompany said.

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    Chelsea are made the favourites by the Opta supercomputer, though the model expects a hard-fought encounter.

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    Tottenham have won just one of their last 11 Premier League games against Chelsea (D2 L8), picking up a 2-0 home win in February 2023.

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    Maresca's magic touch

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