Rich illustrates just how impressive the new and improved Zoltan Gera was against Arsenal on Saturday.
The guy who sits behind me said that ‘there’s a really good player in there somewhere’ – and he’s right. Gera was outstanding at West Brom for five years and had some of those chances that narrowly missed in the early weeks of last season gone in, he might have made a flying start to his Fulham career. As it was, his confidence dropped and the Hungarian soon made way for Clint Dempsey.
That doesn’t make him a bad player, though. He still can offer real quality, particularly in the final third as he showed with some of his lively play at the weekend. Gera seemed to have a lot more drive against Arsenal and was unlucky not to get on the scoresheet. Keep this up and Damien Duff’s injury lay-off might be less problematic.
It can sometimes to fruitless searching for a reason for these seemingly random fluctuations in form, but it doesn’t seem the fans trying. Personally, I’d wager that Gera’s confidence was sky-high after that wonderstrike at Manchester City and that he wanted to grab an unexpected chance against Arsenal with both hands. And how he did.