Fulham manager Roy Hodgson has admitted that striker David Healy does not feature in his first XI plans for the new season.
The Northern Ireland international has been linked with a move away from Craven Cottage this summer, with Cardiff and Hull believed to be interested.
Healy has struggled to make his mark in the Premier League after being signed by former boss Lawrie Sanchez in a £1.5million deal from Leeds last summer.
With Fulham having splashed out to bring new strikers Andy Johnson and Bobby Zamora to the club, Hodgson admits Healy’s opportunities are going to be limited.
He said: “I can understand links being made because he didn’t feature very much last season, and he didn’t feature very much in the pre-season games.
“It’s fairly obvious to everyone that having paid the money we’ve paid for Zamora and Johnson that they will be the first two centre-forwards.
“If he is being linked with moves I can fully understand it.”
Fulham only beat the drop on the final day of last season after a nail-biting fight against relegation, and Hodgson is eager to avoid a similar battle this term.
He added: “The major target has got to be to stay in the league, I think that’s the major target for half the teams in the league.
“We’d like to improve considerably on what we did last year, but I don’t want to quantify that by saying ‘this place’ or ‘that place’.
“I’ll wait and see how the season pans out and how good we can be and then maybe we’ll start setting definite targets through the course of the season.”
