Blackburn 1 - Fulham 1

Diouf wins plaudits as Schwarzer drops ball

Points Awards

• Yellow Card (1): B. Hangeland
• Assist (1): R. Nelsen
• Comedy value (1): M. Schwarzer
• Assist (1): M. Schwarzer
• Disappointing player (3): M. Schwarzer

It seems like only yesterday that we were pointing out how Blackburn’s El-Hadji Diouf can be an irritating little sod. And here, seven days later, the man with the permanent“who, me?” expression and the constantly changing hairstyle, provided the major talking point of the first half at Ewood Park on Saturday. You have to give him credit: he spreads f**kwittery with the same efficiency that a snotty-nosed kid passes on the flu virus.

If Diouf was the supporting actor, Fulham goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer was the centre-stage hero. Seven minutes in, the veteran Australian came to the edge of his 18-yard box to punch — or maybe catch, it was hard to tell – an intercontinental ballistic missile delivered by Blackburn keeper Paul Robinson. Not only was the decision to leave his line the wrong one, he also made a hash of the clearance, leaving the ball to fall at the feet of Blackburn’s Morten Gamst Pedersen. With Pedersen’s exquisite chip floating towards goal, it was only the intervention of Fulham’s Brede Hangelund that saved Schwarzer from a certain three points for an assist.

Still, he gets one point anyway for general discombobulation and comedy value, especially since replays showed that in the scuffle he put his fingertips on the ball while standing outside the box, a foul that went unspotted by referee Anthony Taylor.

But the best f**kwittery was yet to come – thanks to Diouf. In the 28th minute, Robinson hoofed a free kick toward the Blackburn goal and Schwarzer – are you getting a sense of deja vu? – came sprinting out in the general direction of his 18-yard line. Simultaneously, El-Hadji Diouf lowered his shoulder, eyed up Schwarzer, ran straight at him and barged him aside, leaving the ball to bounce off Christopher Samba’s head and into the goal. Fulham players froze in silence, listening in vain for a whistle blowing for a foul. It never came.

Schwarzer may count himself desperately unlucky to be a victim of one of the most coldly calculating chaos-causers in the Premiership. Wrong place. Wrong time. One point for an assist. It’s a hard old world.

By the time Schwarzer came out to intercept — and drop — yet more crosses in the 60th and 70th minutes, we were running out of colourful ways to describe his lapses, having started with ‘looking a little shaky’, progressed through ‘poor judgement’ and concluded with ‘what the f**k?’ So put three more in the book for Schwarzer for Most Disappointing Player. After all, isn’t he still an Arsenal target come the January transfer window? Or maybe not…

Fulham saved Schwarzer the indignity of another F**kwit point for being on the losing side when they clinched an equalizer in the 55th minute. Blackburn defender Ryan Nelsen chalked up a f**kwit assist point for being nowhere in the picture when Danny Murphy’s free kick picked out recent arrival Carlos Salcido, who had plenty of time to collect his thoughts unmolested before delivering the ball for Clint Dempsey to head home inside the six-yard box.
By Marie James

---