FA Cup: Fulham chase Morrison as they reach round four
FULHAM 3 vs NORWICH CITY 0
FULHAM manager Rene Meulensteen is confident of landing West Ham midfielder Ravel Morrison this month, despite revealing shortly after his team’s safe passage into the FA Cup fourth round that a bid had been rejected.
Goals from Darren Bent, Ashkan Dejagah and top-scorer Steve Sidwell decided the third round replay last night and set up a trip to League One Sheffield United.
Despite overseeing the biggest win of his tenure Meulensteen appears determined to add to his creative options, but admits his pursuit of Morrison now lies in the hands of the board.
“We put a bid in for Ravel Morrison, which has been knocked back, so we move on in that one,” said Meulensteen.
“He does want to come here. It goes back to Alastair Mackintosh [chief executive] so we’ll see what happens.”
On the pitch, meanwhile, Meulensteen felt the most pleasing aspect of his side’s showing was the resilience that earned a fourth clean sheet of the season.
“We know that area is something we needed to address,” he said. “We made that our main target, to make sure we were more solid and maybe less adventurous, make sure we shut up shop and I thought we did that pretty well.”
After Norwich midfielder Robert Snodgrass curled a 20-yard effort onto the crossbar, Fulham moved in front on 16 minutes when Bent turned in Pajtim Kasami’s cross.
Four minutes before half-time Dejagah stroked in Alexander Kacaniklic’s low cross. And, on 68 minutes, right-back Sascha Riether crossed for Sidwell to head in his sixth goal of the season.