A lovely feature from the Standard’s Dom Smith on how Calvin Bassey has overcome a shaky start at Craven Cottage to become one of the first names on the Fulham team-sheet.
The Nigerian international has been one of the most consistent centre backs in the Premier League this season and played a key role in Fulham keeping a clean sheet against Spurs on Sunday. That commanding performance, including a moment where he used his strength to shunt Christian Romero off the ball, stood in stark contrast to the two errors that handed Tottenham a 2-0 win at the Tottenham Hotspur Park Stadium in October 2023 as he struggled on the right side of Marco Silva’s central defence.
That is merely a bad memory now as Bassey has become both a cult hero and a goal threat, scoring twice at Old Trafford and heading in an important winner against high-flying Nottingham Forest. As Smith says:
“To his closest friends at the club – Emile Smith Rowe and Nigeria team-mate Alex Iwobi – Bassey is a prankster and a bundle of laughs. To Fulham, he is a serious player.”
He is having a great season and long may it continue, I wish our defenders wouldn’t keep passing the ball back to Leno though as his kicking needs a lot of improvement also his dead ball kicks never go to our players, Leno makes good saves but he needs to improve his ball control with his feet.
Great defender: front foot defending, winning duels, stepping in, closing down.
Characteristics that Robinson and Tete also have!
Weak spot defensively remains Castagne who is mostly on the back foot, on his heels, tracking backwards, not stepping in, avoiding duels and often leaving the space for his opponent to cross.