Everton preparing Dempsey bid

The Clint Dempsey-to-Everton rumours don’t show any sign of subsiding.

Taking their cue from The Sun, Goal are reporting that Everton are planning to table a £4m bid for Dempsey. There doesn’t seem to be too much new information in the article, although they repeat the questionable claim that Clint has turned down a new contract at Fulham.

At least the report suggests that Fulham are prepared to put up a fight to keep the American midfielder (misidentified as a striker). It looks like it could be something of a nervy summer.

Albion confident Greening will stay

West Brom have denied rumours that Jonathan Greening is looking to make a quick return to the Premier League.

The former Manchester United midfielder has already professed his loyalty to the Baggies but press reports suggesting that Fulham had offered Albion £2m for Greening’s services meant that his future was once again up for discussion in the Midlands.

West Brom chairman Jeremy Peace insisted that there was no pressure on new manager Roberto Di Matteo to sell any member of his squad.

There’s a lot of stuff swirling around out there about Jonno at the moment.

But we don’t have to do business and we won’t be doing business with our best players.

We’re cash-neutral so we can afford to buy before we sell but we won’t sell our crown jewels. Our goal is to try and stay in Premier League over time.

Pantsil wants to build on ‘best season ever’

John Pantsil thinks Fulham can build on the foundations of their best ever Premier League finish and do even better in the coming campaign. The Ghana right back also wants to continue his own personal improvement, describing his first season at Craven Cottage as his ‘best ever season’ in the Premier League.

Pantsil, who played for Ghana in their World Cup qualifying campaign shortly after the English season drew to a close, has flown out to Australia for Fulham’s pre-season tour which begins next week against Gold Coast United. He has set some pretty high goals for the new campaign.

We had a really fine season the last term but every time you look to improve so hopefully we should do better than our 7th place finish.

Key to our season will be how we can keep our feet on the ground. After what we did last season it is important we play at a similar level.

On a personal level I just want to play good and improve on what I consider my best season ever in the Premiership.

Gold Coast boss keen to ruffle ‘rusty’ Fulham

Fighting talk from the Gold Coast this morning. You’d expect nothing less from the coach of an Australian sporting side, would you?

Miron Bleiberg, manager of Gold Coast United, says his side will be aiming to take advantage of any ‘ring rustiness’ when Fulham open their Australian pre-season tour Skilled Park next Wednesday night.

We know this is going to be a very tough game, but we also know that perhaps this is a good time to play them as it’s so early in their pre-season program. Our players are in their second month of pre-season training but Fulham will only be in their second week. Naturally, we will be doing everything we can to take advantage of that.

I watched them on TV about ten times last season and they will of course know nothing about us. They have great players but the likes of Andrew Johnson, Bobby Zamora and Danny Murphy, etc, will be different players in a month or so when they are approaching full competition fitness.

That’s not to say that they won’t be fit and sharp against us; they will be I’m sure. It’s not as if players from the English Premier League sit around eating pies and drinking soft drinks for a month, so their base fitness will still be there.

Bleiberg also says he wants his players to take the game to Fulham in what could make for an entertaining contest.

We know what a good side Fulham are and we know the very high standard of the competition they play in, but we have good players who work hard and we will be giving it our very best shot. We will approach this game like we approach any other – with confidence. That’s the mindset we have established with our players from day one and we see no need to change that.

We have no intention of trying to close out the game and defend for our lives, that’s not how we play football and we will be putting on a brave performance against Fulham. We will take a lot from the match and it will act as brilliant preparation for the A-League season

Fulham name squad for Melbourne

Fulham have announced their squad for next Saturday’s friendly against Melbourne Victory.

It is a mixture of experienced first-team players, returning loanees and some of our youth and reserve team talent. It’s been reported as a fairly strong squad Down Under and, although I wouldn’t agree with Kevin Muscat’s assessment that it’s a full-strength side. take out our internationals and it looks like as a good a side as we could have sent out there.

I haven’t seen a different squad list for our first game against the Perth Glory next Thursday so I would imagine that the same players will be involved in that game.

GOALKEEPERS: Schwarzer, Zuberbuhler, Stockdale.

DEFENDERS: Baird, Briggs, Hughes, Kallio, Kelly, Leijer, Pantsil, Smalling, Stoor.

MIDFIELDERS: Gera, Seol, Murphy, Andranik, Saunders.

STRIKERS: A. Johnson, E. Johnson, Kamara, Nevland, Zamora.

Milan join Crouch race

All the major papers have covered our interest in Peter Crouch this morning so this might have more substance to it than first thought. The trouble is that the Independent are leading with the fact that AC Milan are also interested in the Portsmouth forward and I guess Crouch could be tempted to try his luck abroad. A spell with an Italian side, particularly Milan, might make Fabio Capello sit up and take notice too. The price seems to have rocketed up to £15m as well.

Sam Wallace suggests that Crouch has made it onto Milan’s list of targets after they failed to tempt Emmanuel Adebayor away from Arsenal for the second successive summer. Coach Leonardo’s interest is apparently genuine and it follows previous interest from Italian sides. It wouldn’t just be Milan we’d be battling for Crouch’s signature as Sunderland are keen too and Aston Villa and Crouch’s former club Tottenham could make an offer if they can raise funds through summer sales.

Wallace does believe that our participation in Europe does hand us a bit more bargaining power in the hunt for new players, though.

Fulham’s seventh-place finish in the Premier League last season means they have a place in the Europa League – formerly the Uefa Cup – and can be more flexible on wages than before. Their striking options include Andy Johnson, Bobby Zamora, Eric Nevland and Diomansy Kamara, as well as Eddie Johnson, who is likely to leave this summer. Andy Johnson and Zamora managed nine Premier League goals between them last season; two fewer than Crouch scored for Portsmouth.

Fulham weigh up move for Crouch

The Daily Mail claims that Fulham have put Peter Crouch at the top of their summer shopping list.

Roy Hodgson is certainly in the market for a new striker – potentially to replace the disappointing Bobby Zamora – and the tall and athletic Crouch would seem the fit the profile of the kind of player that the Fulham manager would like to bring to the club. The rumoured £10m asking price seems a lot higher than the Whites would want to pay and might prove to be the stumbling block in a potential move for the England international.

On the player’s part, Crouch has publicly voiced his frustration at not knowing what the future holds at Fratton Park. A mass exodus looks set to continue during the transfer window, the proposed takeover by a Middle-Eastern moneyman who was cut out of the Manchester City remains in the balance and there are rumours about the managerial situation. The Mail report suggests that Crouch would prefer to stay in the south should he move on and that the carrot of European football, which he experienced with Pompey last season, could prove very attractive indeed.

The same article links us with the West Brom midfielder Jonathan Greening, who could be keen on staying in the Premier League. The Baggies are believed to value the former Manchester United player at around £3m and Fulham could move to test the resolve of new Albion boss Roberto Di Matteo.

Cravencottage.us

The more eagle-eyed among you might have relised that Trygol, the excellent site run by a regular commenter her at Hammy End, Jason Gatties, has vanished from our blogroll. Well, fear not, because Jason hasn’t hung up his boots but merely changed his focus. His new site – cravencottage.us – is designed to take a look at Fulham from his unique perspective as an American supporter.

There are a few excellent Fulham sites around now, which makes searching for news and stimulating debate a lot easier for us fans. I’ve always found Jason’s posts and comments to be perceptive and thought provoking. If you haven’t already taken a look at the new site, I’d urge you to do so now by clicking here. You’ll find Jason’s take on the players we’ve released, some reflections on Clint Dempsey at the Confederations Cup and some cool footage from yesteryear as the Whites took on Bristol Rovers.

The past part is that the new site’s still evolving. Jason hopes to be finished with the redesign in time for the start of our Europa League campaign at the end of the month. It’ll certainly be worth checking back again and again. Good luck mate!

Montella calls it a day

Legendary Italian striker Vincenzo Montella has decided to retire from football, according to a report in Il Corriere Dello Sport

Montella is contracted to Roma for another season, but will cease playing immediately. There has been no official announcement from the player or his club at the moment.

The man affectionately known as ‘The Little Aeroplane’ after his famous flying goalscoring celebration began a highly successful career at Empoli in 1992. He went on to play for Genoa, Sampdoria and Roma, but Fulham fans will remember with great fondness his loan spell at Craven Cottage in 2007.

Montella made his Fulham debut as a substitute in our Third Round FA Cup tie at Leicester, playing the last twenty minutes in an entertaining 2-2 draw. He replaced Heidar Helguson to make his league debut for the Whites at West Ham and played a pivotal part as the visitors fought back to secure a thrilling 3-3 draw..

The Italian made a memorable impact as a substitute in the Cup replay against Leicester, as he came off the bench at half-time with the Whites 2-1 down to the Championship side. He scored twice to level the tie at 3-3 and, with extra-time looming, a stunning solo winner from Wayne Routledge clinched Fulham’s place in the fourth round.

He made his first start for the Whites the following wekeend against Stoke and turned in a man-of-the-match performance. Montella scored one and made the other two goals as the home side stormed to a 3-0 win. Montella played in the defeat at Sheffield United that suggested everything wasn’t well in the Fulham garden and was involved as the side bounced back to beat Newcastle, before they went down to a narrow defeat at Bolton.

His Fulham career was soured by a sending off late in the 4-0 Cup defeat by Tottenham, which ruled him out of crucial games in the relegation run-in. Although Chris Coleman only used him as a substitute for the most part, Montella didn’t get much of a look-in under Coleman’s replacement Lawrie Sanchez. Despite scoring a crucial goal against Blackburn, Montella saw his loan deal terminated a week before it’s expiration.

Montella was delighted with the rapport he’d built up with the Fulham fans, telling the official website during his loan spell:

It’s magnificent because they were singing my name against Leicester before I’d scored my goals. The fans appear to have prepared their songs as soon as I arrived in London. Fortunately they haven’t had to wait too long to see the aeroplane celebration!

We wish Vincenzo all the best in his retirement.

Fulham confirm seven are on their way out

Fulham have confirmed that seven members of their squad will be leaving the club this summer.

As expected, Moritz Volz is on his way after reaching the end of his current contract. If you missed it, I paid my own personal tribute to Volzy yesterday. I’m not sure which performances against Tottenham in recent seasons the club are describing on the offal – it surely can’t be the Boxing Day game when we were thumped 5-1 at the Lane and Volz was sent off having only come on as a substitute at half-time.

It’s no great shock that Collins John has been released either. There isn’t really too much more to add to the general consensus that John has wasted his chance to have a really terrific career. It could have been so different as he started his Fulham career brilliantly, scoring some impressive goals at Loftus Road and then finishing the following season as our top league goalscorer. But, he semed to be infatuated with the assistant referee’s flag and annoyed successive managers with his attitude, which left a lot to be desired. The fact that Charlton passed on the chance of signing him after a dismal trial last year shows just how far he’s fallen.

Confirmation of Leon Andreasen’s departure was also not unexpected. I felt the Danish midfielder had plenty to offer – tough in the tackle and a powerful runner – but he wasn’t getting enough games in the side. The stats suggest he might have given the ball away a little too often for Roy’s liking, but I think the main reason for the move was that he hadn’t really settled in England. I’m sure he’ll do very well at Hannover, where he was on loan since January.

There’s no word on whether Olivier Dacourt has retired and we all knew that his spell at Fulham was only due to be a brief one. Julian Gray didn’t have all that many chances to impress given the settled nature of our midfield and it’s best for his career that he moved on. You can only assume that if Roy felt he was likely to make a real difference in the Premier League he would have kept him on. And the chances of Giles Barnes earning a permanent deal now appear very slim indeed.

I am surprised, however, that the club have released Karim Laribi, a promising member of both the youth team and the reserve side in the past couple of years. He chances of breaking into the firs-team might have been slim but he certainly looked like a good prospect when I  had the opportunity to watch him.