Jol: Let's not paint it black

Martin Jol today hit back at the Fulham doom mongers who believe the club are in freefall in the Premier League and facing a fight for survival.

Jeers greeted the home draw with Wigan and the Fulham faithful, who made the long haul to Championship Blackpool for Tuesday’s FA Cup third round replay, were loud in their condemnation of the team’s performance before the Whites finally scraped through in extra-time.

Yet Jol insisted there are false alarms sounding over Fulham’s form which has seen them win only two of their last 14 league games. They now lie just six points off the drop zone with a difficult midweek derby against West Ham and a clash with leaders Manchester United to come in the wake of tomorrow’s test at City. But Jol pointed out: “We are still unbeaten in January.

“We won two away games which is good, against West Brom and Blackpool. And we got two draws against Blackpool and Wigan, so it is not alarming. It would have been better if we got all the points against Wigan, or Southampton against whom we had two draws. That was disappointing because you can’t expect a team like Fulham to reckon with six points against Manchester City away and then against Manchester United. Every point we get from those two games will be a bonus, but we will fight for every point.”

Significantly, Fulham’s form took a dive when Brede Hangeland was sent off against Sunderland in mid-November and Jol regrets not appealing against his captain’s three-match ban after Manchester City managed to overturn Vincent Kompany’s red card for a similar tackle at Arsenal.

Jol, boosted by the return of Steve Sidwell tomorrow after the midfielder missed the last two games with a hamstring injury, said: “I still feel Brede’s tackle was a good tackle, but I thought it wouldn’t help to get an appeal in.

“My fear was instead of a three-game ban it would become four games.”