Roy Hodgson felt Fulham were good value for their late win over Birmingham this afternoon but admitted his side had to ‘dig deep’.

Fulham were well below their best in a disappointing first half and might have been more than a goal down at half time. The Whites were somewhat fortunate only to trail to Chris Baird’s early own goal. Hodgson’s team talk roused the home side and Damien Duff and Bobby Zamora scored the goals that earned the three points.

We got off to the worst possible start with the own goal aftrr three minutes. But to come in at half-time 1-0 down after the way we had played was harsh on the players.

I knew it was going to be tough in the second half, as we’d had a tough week and I was worried that we would not be able to keep it going. We were fortunate with the wonder strike from James McFadden that hit the underside of the crossbar but otherwise I thought we were really good value for our victory.

We had more shots, more opportunities and more of the play – we had to dig deep and score two great goals to win it, but we got there in the end.