Tom Cairney felt Fulham delivered a fantastic response to going a goal down as they blew Ipswich away with four goals in seven second half minutes at Craven Cottage last night.
The Fulham captain said the Whites were disappointed to trail at half time to Joe Garner’s header having thoroughly dominated the first half, but was pleased to see his side take a firm grip on the game after Jordan Spence was dismissed for a wild lunge at Aboubakar Kamara. Cairney told FulhamFCTV after the final whistle:
It was a great second half. I thought we were good in the first half as well, but it was the same old story, we couldn’t go 1-0 up! We came in at half time and said we needed to start fast again, score an early goal if we can and we had a great ten minutes.
The Scottish international was full of praise for Aboubakar Kamara, who added another double to his brace that grabbed a point at Hull on Saturday to take him to six goals for the season:
Abou at the weekend came on and changed the game. He gave us a threat in behind – I’m delighted for him really. He’s improved. Every week in training he’s got better and better and better as he’s gone on and I’m delighted for him.
Cairney was modest about his sensational bit of skill that set up Ryan Sessegnon’s second goal to put clear water between the sides. The Fulham playmaker darted between two defenders and sent a low cross right across the goalline with virtually no room to work in and said he was playing on instinct as he weaved a path between the Ipswich centre halves on the byline:
I don’t know why I did that. Everyone goes mad at me for not shooting enough. You kind of get in the zone a little bit in the box. I’ve just seen a few bodies and tried to weave my way through it and then I’ve seen a white shirt out the corner of my eye, I didn’t know it was Sess – left backs aren’t meant to be that far forward but he doesn’t seem to go by the book – and there he was for a tap in.
Cairney also confirmed that, despite a little more pain due to the intensity of the festive fixture programme, he was back to full match sharpness having seen his season badly affected by the troublesome knee injury that he picked up during Fulham’s pre-season preparations.
I feel good. I think that’s eight or nine games in a row and we’ve got six wins. To be fair this Christmas period’s been hard, it’s a little bit more sore than it was previously, but I’ll just get a bit of rest and then go again.
