Fulham 3 West Ham 1

Yet more misery on the road and a sullen trip home from West London to East London, this time at the hands of a team I`d expect to beat.

Big Sam shuffled the pack with Joe Cole returning, Chamakh starting up front and with Andy Carroll, returning from injury, on the bench.

It could have been the perfect start for West Ham, but Joe Col spurned a decent chance inside the first minute, a chance we were left to rue when our hosts took the lead in the 8th minute.

Having conceded a set piece, our static defence saw Damien Duff`s cross flicked on by Brede Hangeland for Dimitar Berbatov to score at the far post. Berbatov more or less gave the game away by glancing towards the linesman to see if he was onside, when he clearly wasn`t, but the officials awarded the goal.

For the remainder of the half, Fulham were on top but couldn`t force a second goal. West Ham`s closest effort came from Kevin Nolan who saw an effort go wide.

The second half started with a flurry of activity with West Ham getting level three minutes into the half. From a set-piece, Nolan los this marker and was on hand to turn the ball home, past Schwarzer.

But much to our dismay, getting back on level terms didn`t last long with Fulham edging back ahead a minute later when another ball in from Duff evaded our defence and Hugo Rodallega rose to head home.

Always chasing the game, the Hammers came up against a keeper in form, in the shape of Schwarzer who denied Nolan and Andy Carroll, as the Fulham defence held firm. Matters got worse in the last minute when Joey O`Brien turned a shot from Mladen Petric into his own net and it was a moody away support that jumped on the District Line to head back towards East London.

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