Chris Coleman said Fulham’s win over Liverpool was a fitting tribute to the club’s greatest ever player Johnny Haynes, who died last week in a car crash.
Goals from Collins John and Luis Boa Morte clinched a special victory on an emotional day at Craven Cottage and Coleman was delighted with his side’s superb display.
“It was fitting that we played and beat the European Champions. It’s right that we paid tribute to a great man, obviously he was Fulham’s greatest ever player and one of the greatest to ever come out of this country. I don’t think it could have gone any better. It was a special atmosphere today and it was great that the fans were celebrating because they’ve been quite patient with us.
We looked more solid through the middle because we made a conscious effort in training this week to try and frustrate them. I was sick of playing good football, opposing managers saying what a good team we are and getting no points. I was quite prepared to be as ugly as we had to be to get a win. It could have backfired, we could have lost and it would have looked like we were being negative. But I didn’t care; it was a chance I was willing to take.”
Coleman also hailed the contribution of former Liverpool goalkeeper Tony Warner, who was magnificent against his old club.
“I thought he was outstanding. It’s hard for a goalkeeper to come on. His concentration had to be one hundred percent and it was. He pulled off some fantastic saves. We were lucky that we had such quality on the bench. Tony’s here until January but it’s a move that we’re going to try and make permanent with Cardiff.”
The Fulham boss also had words of praise for John, who lead the line with real intelligence.
“Collins is fantastic. He’s a goal scorer and he’s only going to get better. He’s got a lot of ability and he needed to add to his game. He needed to understand what the team needed from him when we didn’t have the ball.”
