Fulham head coach Marco Silva has refused to blame Financial Fair Play for the club’s slow progress in the summer transfer market, telling yesterday’s press conference that the Whites’ cliff-edge compliance with the Premier League regulations ‘can’t be an excuse for everything’.

Silva once again expanded on his frustration at a lack of new arrivals to follow Issa Diop and Shane Duffy over the past week in his question and answer session with journalists at Motspur Park ahead of tonight’s trip to Arsenal. He said:

“It’s not good for us talk before a tough game, an important game for us, about the situation. But financial fair play cannot be an excuse for everything. It is taking more time than I would like.

The striker position is a good example. We are playing just with Mitro and Mitro is doing an amazing job scoring goals. He is full of confidence but looking for the bench and we don’t have even one more striker there. That is not a normal thing. ‘Why’ is a good question, but I would like to have the right answer for you but I don’t right now.”