Marco Silva hailed his history makers after Fulham bounced back from a disappointing defeat by Crystal Palace on Saturday with their first league win at Wolverhampton Wanderers in forty years.
The Fulham boss made five changes to his starting line-up and Ryan Sessegnon scored within 58 seconds of his first league start since rejoining the Whites from Tottenham. Joao Gomes equalised for Wolves, but Rodrigo Muniz restored the Londoners’ lead a minute into the second half when he lifted a lovely finish over Jose Sa after latching onto Adama Traore’s through ball.
Silva told his post-match press conference at Molineux:
“We knew that we were going to need some fresh legs. The last game for us on Saturday was a difficult one, performance-wise was not the best, and I knew that coming here the game was going to demand from us some fresh legs. Some players that we decided wouldn’t start the game, like Alex Iwobi, [Antonee] Robinson, Calvin [Bassey], because they are the players with more minutes in our team.
It’s not easy when you change five players, when you are playing at the level we are playing in the Premier League. Willian is not ready to start a game yet from a physical point of view, and we don’t have other wingers, that is the reality, we don’t have solutions. That was the first reason we changed the formation.
We know that Ryan Sessegnon is able to play wing-back very well, he has the composure to attack the box in the right moment, like he did for the first goal. I see it every day at the training ground. He knows he is going to have Jorge Cuenca to cover him [at left centre back]. I knew he wouldn’t be able to play ninety minutes, but it is really nice to see him and Jorge Cuenca – in his second Premier League start – do well in a demanding game away from home against Wolves.
I know Fulham have not won here [in the league] in forty years, it’s been our story with Fulham every time we go away from home – the numbers are incredible how many times Fulham was not winning in certain stadiums of this country. We have been breaking that situation. It is nice to give that feeling to the fans when they go on the road, they know that Fulham are going to be able to seeing Fulham winning games and be competitive in the Premier League.”
On paper, a weakened team. But every single one of them gave 100%.
Both goals were brilliantly created and scored and, in all honesty, we should have had more despite Wolves having a huge percentage of possession.
The only real negative was the needless yellow that Lukic picked up which sees him miss important games but it has been hanging over his head for so long now that it’s best to get it over with.
Silva says Willian isn’t ready to start yet and we don’t have other wingers, Sess is the obvious choice and he proved it with his goal, he also played on the wing in his first stint at our club so I don’t understand what Silva is saying.