Brighton 2 Preston 2
When I got my pre-match call from John Pargiter for a betting tip, I had to tell him I did not feel confident about this fixture. Preston had had 4 consecutive goalless draws with us, beaten Aston Villa and we are going to be without our most influential player Berem Kayal till December after an ankle operation. Kayal had played for Inter and Celtic and only persistent injury prevented him from reaching the high level of consistency with us. At £300,000 he was some bargain. Add to this the Seagulls perennial finishing problem. What we need is one of those selfish lazy poachers that regularly knock in 20 goals a season. We have not had one since Ulloa.
My misgivings proved accurate when Jordan Hugill profited from a mix-up between keeper Stockdale end skipper Bruno to nip in to score. We all agreed at half-time that was as abject a performance as any of us had witnessed in the past 4 seasons. As usual when in the penalty area the wrong option was taken. Boss Chris Hughton must have given the boys a rocket as we were transformed in the second half. Sam Baldock who typifies the hard running, no scoring Brighton forward got onto the end of Bruno’s cross to equalise. Then Glenn Murray with a clever turn profited from Preston keeper Maxwell leaving a gaping gap to slot the ball home. With all Preston subs used and injury reducing them to 10 men you would have thought that we would close the game down and get three points. No. In injury time Preston equalised with a headed cross that Stockdale might have challenged. Two points lost. If it goes to the wire as happened last season these 2 missed points we would rue.
After the game I spoke to Alan Tanner. Fulham are having a strange season, unbeaten away with 3 wins but only one victory against Newcastle at home. Alan advised Pargie to lay Barnsley. Indeed the strategy is to bet against the home team every match (home or away) in which Fulham are playing. Defensive frailties will probably mean that cannot make the automatic berths not surprisingly occupied by relegated Newcastle and Norwich but if they can find home form and meaner defence I can see a play off position. We are heavily reliant on the Kayal/Stephens midfield axis, the match winning of Anthony Knockaert who was off colour yesterday and a well organised defence which was let down by Stockdale. I can see our form sagging till Kayal returns. We need to get Solly March back as he is another scoring option and to invest in the January window.
