For a few moments, it looked as though Bukayo Saka had headed a late winner at Craven Cottage on Sunday. But then VAR intervened, ruling out the ‘goal’ for an offside offence against creator Gabriel Martinelli in the build up.
It meant we had to settle for a single point, in a game in which we dominated for large periods, allowing Fulham only two shots throughout the 90 minutes.
“I haven’t seen a team do what we’ve done here today against them,” the manager said.
“That’s the reality, but you want that and the three points, and that’s what was missing today. We’re going to have to work in that direction and improve those margins.
“We’re very disappointed that we didn’t manage to get the three points, obviously. With the way we dominated the game from the start to the end, and how much the team wanted it, but these are the small margins.
“They have the quality, they had one action to score one goal and we have to dig in to do so much to merit a lot of the stuff that happened in the game on our side. At the end, we find a way to score – it was disallowed - emotionally that was tough.”
The margins were particularly small for the late VAR decision. After William’s Saliba’s equaliser had stood after a video review, Saka’s goal was chalked out – narrowly, and after an agonising wait. The boss said it was difficult to respond after that decision went against us.
“Yeah, it was, but again the way the team plays, the way the team wants it, adapts within the circumstances. At the back, we have the issues that we have, there’s no excuses, we were so intense and so dominant, that’s the way we have to continue to do, improve those margins because there are certain things there that we can still do better to be more efficient but that’s the way we have to continue.
“Now, every three days there’s going to be a game in the festive period that we’re coming into right now, but the team is in a good place. To play the way the boys did today again, big credit, and we’re going to continue doing our best, that’s for sure.”
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