It’s been another poor season at Fulham, one thrashing of QPR apart, and there’s an old Loftus Road employee starting to cop the blame according to Craven Cottage regular Konk.
Assess Fulham's season overall for us — another desperately disappointing one on the face of it?
Konk: Another year of utter shit on and off the pitch. Although I was someone who’d have changed manager in the summer, after making a few decent signings I thought we would be top half even with Kit Symons remaining in place. With a change of manager, I thought we might just sneak the play-offs. However, there’s still no real balance to the squad: the midfield is made up of fairly pedestrian ball-players and there’s been no physical, ball-winning, athletic presence in midfield for a number of seasons, meaning our defence has again failed to receive adequate protection. Once again there’s no real pace in the side, and I’m not convinced defensively by either full-back. Yesterday, someone pointed out that only Blackpool, Villa, Sunderland and Yeovil have picked-up fewer points than us over the last 100 games, whilst we’ve managed to concede 217 goals in 113 league games over the past three seasons. It’s not been great.
Kit Symons has been sacked since we last met, what did you make of his reign and the decision to part company? How will he be remembered?
Konk: I would guess the bulk of our support will remember Kit as a popular player who looked to have done a good job with the academy, stabilised things after the mental experience of Felix Magath, but as someone who was ultimately unable to produce anything other than a middling side, with no indication that better times were around the corner. We scored plenty of goals and played some decent football at times, but the panic that spread through the team and stands whenever a ball was flung into the box was a damning indictment of his inability to address the side’s defensive frailties.
Some people were in favour of giving Symons more time, but I think the majority would have favoured parting ways at the end of last season. I think Symons is neither particularly terrible nor promising as a coach; I’m just not sure he adds enough value in terms of tactics or coaching at the moment to really succeed as a head coach. With Hodgson and Tigana, you saw players’ technique, understanding and fitness improve, and you could see a clearly well-organised side playing to a plan; unfortunately I don’t think we saw enough of that under Kit.
In mitigation, he took over at a very difficult time, with a largely inexperienced, unbalanced squad and it’s not clear how much input he had in identifying potential signings. Seeing some of the stick he’s taken (and sadly, continues to take) I’d be reluctant to go down the route of appointing a former player as manager again — it seems that for every Bill Nicholson, there are a thousand Kit Symons and I’d sooner not see a former favourite getting abused.
The process of replacing him took forever, with that botched approach for Steve Clarke grabbing headlines. Sounded like our old chum Mike Rigg performing at his usual standards. What was that all about?
Konk: We sacked Kit on November 8 and didn’t appoint Jokanovic until December 27. During that period we drew five games and lost seven. Given that most clubs seem to have a replacement lined-up before they sack the incumbent, it was a bit alarming to see us managing to stretch the process out to almost two months, but entirely symptomatic of the way the club is currently run. Peter Grant initially took charge of the first team despite publically saying he didn’t want the job, whilst Alan Curbishley, who was said to be interested, sat around doing whatever it is he does (no-one really knows).
On November 19, Steve Clarke was telling the world that he’d rejected the chance to manage Fulham, with stories then emerging that Fulham had refused to meet his personal demands, and others (me amongst them) worried that the prospect of a transfer embargo had scared him off. Either way, it was no loss to Fulham.
It’s fair to say that rumours that Stuart Gray was about to be appointed weren’t met with overwhelming enthusiasm(!) and following a lot of stick and disenchantment, on December 8, the club then announced that he was actually being appointed as "senior coach” and that we would still be appointing a head coach. This seemed a weird way of doing things unless whoever they had lined-up for head coach had requested that Gray be appointed "senior coach”. Or Mike Rigg wanted Gray in place and didn’t care what our new head coach thought.
We were also linked with Gary Rowett (who denied he’d spoken with us), Paul Lambert and Nigel Pearson, although I’ve no idea who we actually spoke with. There were on/off rumours about Jokanovic throughout the process, and it’s possible he was waiting until the end of Maccabi Tel Aviv’s Champions League campaign, but the suspicion remains that it was a botched exercise and damaging to the club in terms of results in the interim and also our standing within the game.
It’s noticeable that Mike Rigg has almost disappeared from view now, whereas previously he was very bullish about his role and position as the main man at the club. Whether this lower profile was his idea or someone else’s is unknown, but chairman Shahid Khan surely can’t have been impressed with our clownish attempts to recruit a new head coach.
Asides from the failure to change manager sooner, appoint a replacement before we’d played another quarter of the season’s games, and the questionable player recruitment, the fact that Rigg looks and sounds like a particularly annoying contestant from The Apprentice is enough for me. And that’s without knowing his role in the FFP fiasco. I wouldn’t normally lobby for someone to lose their job, but he’s the sort of jammy chancer that would get the boot from us and end up at Real Madrid, so I’d like to see him gone.
And what do you make of the new man now you've finally got him? How's he doing so far?
Konk: I was pleased with the appointment. He’s got a good track record, is respected by Watford fans for the job he did there, and is clearly someone who understands the division. It’s early days, but he appears to have focussed on tightening things up at the back, which is long overdue. Whilst we might not look as threatening up front, we can’t make any progress until we become more resilient, so I think that’s the way to go. I won’t judge him until he’s had a chance to sign/sell players and have a full pre-season, but I’m quietly confident that he’ll do okay.
A transfer embargo through the FFP regulations, despite offloading a good few high earners — how did that happen, how long's it for, who has carried the can for it?
Konk: A genuine mystery. Off the top of my head, I think Hangeland, Duff, Sidwell, Karagounis, Kasami, Diarra, Riise, Heitinga, Boateng, Briggs, Etheridge, Darren fucking Bent, Senderos, Berbatov, Stockdale, Richardson, Hughes, Taarabt, Frei, Riether, Dejagagh, Stekelenburg, Amorebieta, and Mitroglu all either left for free, for fees or on loan. I know we signed Ross McCormack for £7m+ (word on the street, with add-ons totalling £10m), but given that we started the following season with about four hundred teenagers and Mark fucking Fotheringham in our squad, it must have taken a concerted effort to breach FFP.
The embargo covered the January 2016 window, and assuming the geniuses running our club haven’t somehow fallen foul of the rules again, the embargo should be lifted at the end of the current season. Rumours had been circulating for some weeks before the announcement that we were in trouble with FFP, but given the greatly reduced wage bill on the playing front along with a significant number of redundancies elsewhere, it was still something of a surprise when the rumours started gaining traction and were clearly based in reality. Especially as the club had assured supporters that we were fully compliant.
In terms of the blame — with the structure we have in place, it’s difficult to know where responsibilities lie. Mike Rigg has been getting lots of stick for all sorts of things — I’ve no idea whether it’s all fair or not. CEO Alistair Mackintosh has also been heavily criticised by some for his role in the fiasco. I’d have guessed it was Mackintosh’s role to oversee compliance, but no-one’s been fired, taken responsibility or been publically admonished, so we’re in the dark. In the interests of consistency, I’m choosing to blame the whole thing on Darren fucking Bent.
Stand out players and weak links in the current side?
Konk: With a baby son, I’ve only managed to get to half-a-dozen or so games this season, meaning I’m not well qualified to judge, but from what I’ve seen and heard from friends, only Cairney and McCormack would definitely get into one of the top side’s first eleven. The rest are all pretty average for the division, although I dare say players like Stearman would look better in a team that afforded them some protection either through the middle or from the flanks.
I’m personally unconvinced by Jazz ichards at RB (Fredericks was playing there in the game at our place) and Luke Garbutt, on loan from Everton, doesn’t look much better defensively at LB. Alex Kacaniklic on the wing does my head in — he looked a promising player at first, but whilst I don’t need every player to be Stuart Pearce, he never seems fully committed to me. Dembele has done well for a 19 year old and it’s no surprise that he’s been linked with a number of big clubs, and would have signed for Tottenham in January, were it not for Levy shifting the goalposts at the last minute with the agreed loan back arrangement.
Any chance you could go down this season?
Konk: If we had lost McCormack and to a lesser extent, Dembele, in January, then I wouldn’t have ruled out relegation, but as it is, I think/hope we have enough to stay up. We’re four points clear of the relegation spots and five points clear of bottom, with a significantly better goal difference than any of those sides. Of the teams below us, we still have to play Bristol City, MK Dons, Charlton and Bolton at home (final game), and I would hope that there are three worse teams than us between them and Rotherham. However, our last away game is at Brentford, so it’s absolutely sod’s law that we’ll find some way to get relegated at their place.
Assuming you don't, how can this cycle of decline be arrested next season?
Konk: I think we’ve made a good appointment in Jokanovic and if Khan wants to make his money back, then he really needs Fulham to be back in the Premier League; this gives me some hope that he’ll finally do what he can to make that happen. I know we’re still waiting on the QPR FFP decision, but Boro and Derby look to have taken a view that the owner can convert any overspend/personal debt into equity and that it’s a gamble worth taking given the Premier League TV deal. Given that Khan is worth a few billion dollars, he might take the same punt. However, I have a nagging — possibly unfair- feeling that we won’t move forward until we lose Mike Rigg, and I’m also slightly concerned by questions over what degree of influence Khan’s son’s analytics company have in the running of the club. I think there’s room for analytics when identifying potential targets/areas for improvement, but ultimately it should only serve as a starting point, and from that stage, it’s a question of getting out and watching players in the flesh, with the manager making the final decision. And whilst I understand the appeal of a director of football, with Rigg currently in place, I’d like Jokanovic to identify who he wants in/out and finances permitting, the club to follow his wishes.
On a positive note, the redevelopment of the Riverside is going ahead, so that’s at least something to celebrate.
Pictures — Action Images