Roy Hodgson hailed Fulham’s battling qualities after his team came from a goal down to grab a point at Wigan.
The Latics went in front through Emmerson Boyce only to be pegged back by a Clint Dempsey penalty at the end of the first half. Hodgson was delighted that Fulham held on to claim a point.
I am pleased with the point because we had to dig deep for the point today. It’s been a tough week. Whenever you play Liverpool at home or away that’s always going to be a tough ask for you and then to go to Roma, do so well and suffer as we did at the hands of the referee.
I think many a team when they went one goal to nil down here at Wigan would have maybe crumbled or maybe thought the Gods were against us, but we certainly didn’t do that. We kept fighting and I think we created enough goal chances in the game to more than justify the 1-1 scoreline.
Mark Schwarzer had to be at his best today to make sure we didn’t go even further behind. He was fantastic – he really was. Kirkland made two or three incredible saves at the other end so it’s quite strange, a 1-1 game could have easily been 3-3 today because I think both teams gave it their best shot to score goals.
But the defences and in particular the goalkeepers, they’re the ones who are going to take the plaudits. I think his [Schwarzer’s] secret is his incredible professionalism and his incredible desire to keep himself at top level fitness which is not easy to do when you get older.
It’s much easier to rest on your laurels but he’s still got something to go for, he still wants to be president of Australia I think so he’s got plenty to go for yet.
Hodgson said the international break will come at the right time for his squad.
Really, we’re hoping that come two weeks from now when we have another difficult week ahead of us with three matches it’s going to be a much bigger squad to choose from. I think we’re going to need that because there are a lot of games still to be played.
