Marco Silva was impressed with the commanding manner of Fulham’s response to their first defeat of the season after the Whites returned to the top of the table by winning 4-1 at Birmingham City this evening.

Silva’s side were deservedly beaten by newly-promoted Blackpool at the weekend and the Portuguese head coach was pleased that his side put that setback behind them so emphatically at St. Andrew’s. Denis Odoi’s early header was followed by a brace from Aleksandar Mitrovic and a fine strike by Harry Wilson as in-form Birmingham were swept aside.

Silva told FFCTV after the final whistle:

“It was really important to bounce back and get back on the right track again. It was a big response from our players after the result against Blackpool. We expressed ourselves on the pitch and that is something that I want to see. The commitment and the attitude. We knew we had to be really brave to come here and match them. We controlled well these moments and we controlled Chong well. We did really well.

Fulham made four changes following the defeat at Blackpool and Silva was impressed with the performance of the players he brought in.

“We were solid and scoring four goals away from home was a really good sign for us. Joe is more than ready to play if I decide. It is a good battle between him and Robinson. Chalobah is not in his best physical condition, but I know him really well. He will add something really important because he has the character and the personality as well to manage the game, to play forward.

Harry Wilson is not new for us. Unfortunately, he hasn’t played many games in a row. I hope he can play week in, week out to be really important for us. He’s a top class player in my opinion. He’s a happy player, he’s happy to be at Fulham Football Club and that’s really important to me.

After a bad result, we have to show the character and the personality to show something. Playing away against Birmingham is really tough, but we did it. We will analyse this game tomorrow, but we got the three points. We have a few days to prepare for another tough game against Reading.”