Fulham manager René Meulensteen hailed his side’s battling qualities as Fulham grabbed a late point at Manchester United.
Steve Sidwell put the Whites in front in the 19th minute when he volleyed in Lewis Holtby’s brilliant pass. It was a lead Fulham held onto until the 78th minute when Robin van Persie levelled. And United then made it 2-1 little more than a minute later through Michael Carrick’s deflected strike.
But Fulham grabbed a last-gasp equaliser in the final 60 seconds of five added minutes when Darren Bent headed in from a couple of yards out after Kieran Richardson’s fierce drive had been parried into his path.
“We got in front for once and had something to hang onto,” said Meulensteen. “But they maintained the pressure in the second half with good wide positions. But credit to our lads, we hung in there. Their gameplan was quite straightforward – get it wide and get it in. But we defended it well.
“United have got the quality to produce that bit of magic to equalise and they took a lot of confidence from that. Michael Carrick then scored and you think ‘here we go again.’ But the most pleasing thing for me was we reacted, kept our heads up and fought to the end.”
With Fulham leading 1-0, it could have been even better for the visitors in the first half but Kieran Richardson blazed over with just David De Gea to beat.
“It would have given us a bigger platform as they’d have had to score three to win the match,” said Meulensteen. “But luckily we got something out of it.”
Meulensteen made decisive changes following Saturday’s disappointing defeat at the hands of Southampton, with former Manchester United midfielder handed a Premier League debut on his return to Old Trafford and Swedish striker Muamer Tankovic starting up front.
“Sometimes you have to play a certain way because opponents won’t let you play a certain way,” said Fulham’s head coach. “In recent weeks we’ve put in an adventurous performance and not really got the results. We knew that we had to be more compact in tight areas. It’s a big learning curve and if you want to be successful you need energy and quality.
“It felt like a win afterwards. We worked our socks off – everybody did what we wanted them to do. We worked hard in the week and we got reward at the end of it.”
The late point gives Fulham a huge shot in the arm ahead of another tough test on Wednesday when they host in-form Liverpool at the Cottage.
“Liverpool is a massive, massive game,” concluded Meulensteen. “But these players want to play in these sort of games. It’s the most exciting league and you have to step up for the big boys. Hopefully this gives us a good base to kick on.”
