With Roy Hodgson back in the Crystal Palace dugout on Saturday, it got me thinking about how he and Ray Lewington successfully established Fulham as a Premier League force. Readers of this website won’t need reminding of the chronology but Fulham went from nailed on relegation thanks to Lawrie Sanchez to European contenders in a matter of months. Hodgson’s approach was detail, discipline and doggedness – especially on the road. Fulham became harder to beat, but they saved their expansive football for the Cottage and, although the Whites gained plenty of precious away points, it wasn’t pretty.

What prompted these idle thoughts? Well, assessing Saturday’s stalemate at Selhurst Park, is far from straightforward. Much of the commentary has centred around Fulham’s failure to find the net having created a number of presentable opportunities and questioned Raul Jimenez’s spot in the side after the striker’s long run without a goal continued. The immediate emotion after the final whistle was that two points had slipped away, but Fulham’s defensive diligence has barely been commented on.

The Whites’ third clean sheet of the Premier League season was by far the easiest. Marco Silva’s side certainly rode their luck at Everton and Luton Town are probably still wondering how they didn’t score at the Cottage. By contrast, Palace were poor in the final third – as Hodgson himself admitted after the game – and barely threatened Bernd Leno, who has been in superb form so far this season. Antonee Robinson referenced how well the back four were performing in his FFCTV interview and, whilst the excellence of Tim Ream and Issa Diop has been well established, the versatility of Timothy Castagne – excellent at right back having made his home debut on the other flank – underlined what a bargain the Belgian could prove to be.

Harrison Reed and Joao Palhinha are both difficult to play through, as Palace discovered, and can distribute the ball purposefully. The only problem with a strong away performance, where Fulham fashioned a number of good openings, was the decision-making in the final third. Nowhere was this more succinctly demonstrated that during the three-on-two in the second half, sparked by a superb Bobby Decordova-Reid tackle. The bubbly Bristolian chose the wrong option in looking for Raul, but there was still no excuse for Andreas Pereira not be busting a gut to get the telling touch at the far post.

The Jimenez/Vinicius/Muniz question will probably rumble on until January unless the Mexican starts scoring goals to match the quality of his approach play. Peter Rutzler adroitly analyses the centre forward situation in his Athletic article this morning. I felt Jimenez was far more effective at Palace than he had been against Luton and the touch to control Pereira’s ball that created his clearest chance was pure Dimitar Berbatov. Silva still sounds convinced that the goals will come for Jimenez – and is not as if there isn’t precedent. Barry Hayles waited seven games to break his Fulham duck after signing from Bristol Rovers in 1997, for instance – and he went on to be a cult hero.

It’s hard to shake the feeling that on another day Fulham would have won this game comfortably. Perhaps it would have been as simple as keeping the Serbian who wore the number nine shirt at the start of the season. But away points are not to be sniffed at and Fulham are properly ahead of where anyone thought they would have be at this stage. Given how Silva has made Fulham both successful and stylish, I’m interested to see what happens over the next few motnhs.