Fourth Round Proper

Craven Cottage, Fulham

Sunday 12th January 2025

With the WSL sides joining this round, the bigger stadiums come onto my radar. But we still have some lower league teams in the competition. Today's trip blends lower league and classic stadium as step 5 Fulham, the lowest ranked team still standing, host Championship side London City Lionesses at Craven Cottage.

History on Fulham's side with two WFA Cups to their name, albeit in an earlier iteration of the club.

As we get deeper into the competition games are getting shown live on TV, including today's which has been moved to a midday kickoff, so an early train for me having to avoid more engineering works on my home line.

No storms this round, but temperatures have been below zero for quite a few days now but with us being at a Premier League football ground should be no problems with the pitch.

It's been a few years since I've been to Craven Cottage, it remains one of the iconic grounds of English football. Three modern stands, from recent years developments but today everyone is in the rustic brilliance of the Johnny Haynes stand.

Big fan of an early KO so very happy with midday start.

From the outset the difference in quality between the teams was apparent. Lionesses having, I would guess,  90% possession and the Fulham defence doing well to keep them at bay. Swedish international Kosovare Asllani was controlling the centre of the park and the home side did well to keep the scores level.The inevitable happened on 25 minutes with Chantelle Boye-Hlorkah nipping in to open the scoring. This was to be the start of an eight minute hat-trick for The Pride striker, who was apparently wearing boots given to her by French international and WSL star Kenza Dali.

It was very much one-way traffic and the heroics of Frankie Gibbs in the home goal kept the score down. 

HT 0-3

Any hopes of a Fulham comeback were erased on 54 minutes when keeper Gibbs was adjudged to have fouled Asllani and the referee awarded a penalty. There was a delay of several minutes for treatment to Gibbs before Asllani converted the spot kick.

Gibbs wasn't able to continue and was replaced by substitute keeper Amber Webber. One of her first tasks was to retrieve the ball from the net after Izzy Goodwin made it five nil on 65 minutes following a lovely back heel pass from Asllani.

London City could and maybe should have added more goals, but credit to the Fulham side who continued to contain their higher level opponents and keep the score line respectable. 

A deserved victory for the Championship side, who will be a match for any opponent in the Fifth Round.

FT. Fulham 0 London City Lionesses 5.

Full match video can be seen on YouTube link:

https://www.youtube.com/live/3jMuBCscXac?si=jIiQOarB6ZSp9Kfc