Marco Silva is relishing the challenge of testing himself against ‘one of the best teams in the world’ in Manchester City tomorrow – and wants his Fulham side to rise to the occasion.
Pep Guardiola’s charges come to Craven Cottage for the early kick off fully focused on getting a crucial three points in their push for another Premier League and the Fulham head coach knows just how big a task he faces.
“We are going to face, if not the best team in the world, probably one of the best teams in the world, with no doubts about it. They are the champions, they want to be champions again, and are in a big fight with Arsenal to achieve it. Great season for both sides, but it’s not for us to talk about that race. We talk about ourselves and we are going to fight for the result and prepare ourselves for it.
Last season at the Cottage was a really good game from ourselves, but unfortunately we haven’t got what we probably deserved in that game. That’s all it is. Let’s try to improve for the next one.
Last season I was questioned many times – and probably fair enough – about us being good against the teams below ourselves. Against the teams above ourselves, we just won one, against the top sides we hadn’t won, all that stuff. I think this season we gave some steps in this aspect, we have been really tough to play against. Last season we were, but we didn’t achieve the results. This season it’s been different, we have been achieving some great results with some great performances against the top sides of this Premier League.
It’s a great challenge again because it’s a team that demands many, many things from you, it’s a team that probably like no other team in the world has the capacity to have the ball and to keep the possession and frustrate the opposition side with the possession that they have. They take a lot of energy, not just from your body but emotionally as well. For us, for example, we don’t like to not have [possession]. If you ask me, would I like to have more of the ball than them, I would love it.
It’s not going to be easy, the way they play, the way they approach the games, and because of that it’s going to be a game that is going to demand from ourselves to be really resilient. Apart from the good organisation that we have to show in both sides, defensive and offensive as well, we have to be really resilient. Clinical, ruthless as well to be able to match them and to fight to get a good result.”
