Martin Jol says he is excited by the prospect of beginning Fulham’s European campaign against NSI Runavik tomorrow.
The new Fulham manager says plenty of sides would jump at the chance of being involved in continental competition, despite the early start to the new season.
I would imagine that there are quite a few teams that would like to be in Europe. In Holland you play for Europe and I think it is the same in England. In the league you play for the support and yourself.
You want to stay in the league firstly but secondly you want to finish in the first five or six spots. You want to be in Europe. That is the goal. Maybe that wasn’t the goal for Fulham but because they are playing the way they did they did well in the Fair Play cup. If you can do that and if you’re lucky enough you play in Europe so you can’t complain. Two years ago they did unbelievably well, gave the club a good profile in Europe and the money was coming in as well.
You need a bit of luck but I remember Fulham playing against Shakhtar Donetsk and beating them. I can’t remember Shakhtar losing a game at home so they certainly played a way that could be successful in Europe, so why not?
Jol still isn’t being drawn on potential transfer targets.
I will never name names because in this business there are always other clubs watching you. We will do that privately. I have seen eight or nine names linked with us and that was not true. Of course you know there are a few players without a contract now, like [Zoltan] Gera for example. We need a couple of additions but I won’t bring players here for the sake of it because we still have young players as well.
I have to give them a chance to play, to be happy and to develop themselves. I think there will be two or three players coming into my squad and I will give them a chance in the next couple of weeks to prove themselves.
We have got a few youngsters in the squad so of course there are four or five players not here, they are on holiday so it is a nice opportunity for these youngsters to show and prove themselves. I can’t imagine going out in the first round but it is football so you never know. You could say that it is 90% sure that we go through but you still have to do the business and our players know that
