Fulham Football Club
1878 London
West London based club Fulham play in the Premier League, after achieving promotion back to the top flight under Marco Silva in the 2021/22 season. Fulham play their games at Craven Cottage and are also known as The Cottagers. Having been founded in 1879, Fulham are London’s oldest professional football club.
The Whites will be hoping that they can manage to ensure Premier League survival in the upcoming campaign, having struggled to maintain their stay in the division for more than a year in recent seasons.
The early years
Fulham were founded under the name of Fulham St. Andrew’s Sunday School FC and managed to enjoy their first taste of success in 1906, winning the Southern League, which they later were able to win in two consecutive years.
In 1907 The Cottagers joined the Second Division of the Football League, losing their first game in the league 1-0 to Hull City. The West Londoners were the London Challenge Cup winners in 1910.
Fulham’s highest finish of their first stint in Division Two came in their inaugural season in the competition and their stay in the league was ended by relegation to the Third Division South in 1928.
Fulham’s return to the Second Division was secured by 1932 and they were close to being promoted once again the following year, ending the season in third. The club would however stay in the Second Division until 1949.
First Division and post-World War II
Fulham played their first ever game in the First Division following their promotion into the league in 1949. The club would stay in the league for three campaigns, finishing bottom of the table with just eight wins in their final season of their first top flight stint.
A second place finish in the Second Division in the 1958/59 season was enough to see The Cottagers return to the top, picking up 60 points over the course of the season. The Whites finished tenth in their first season in the First Division, but for the years that followed they were involved in relegation battles, which eventually caught up with them, ending the 1967/1968 season bottom of the table. They would not return to the First Division until 2001, by which time it had been reformed into the Premier League.
Struggles at the club
Fulham suffered back-to-back relegations and fell to the Third Division in 1969. The Cottagers finished runners up in the league at the second attempt and they returned to the Second Division as a result in 1971.
Whilst Fulham struggled to mount a challenge to return to Division One throughout the 70’s there was still some success in the decade. The Whites managed to reach their first and only FA Cup final in 1975 at the fifth attempt to win a semi final in the competition. Fulham lost the final 2-0 to West Ham United at Wembley.
There were high profile names playing for the club at the time such as George Best, who made 47 appearances for Fulham in the 1976/77 season. This was not enough to stop their relegation back to the Third Division in 1980 however.
Malcolm Macdonald was appointed manager of the club in 1980 to try and steer the club back towards the First Division, but despite having some high-quality players at his disposal, he was only able to return to the Second Division and was replaced by Rob Harford in 1984.
Having been so close to promotion to the First Division, the cost of keeping such expensive players had proven too much for Fulham who were on the brink of collapse. They were relegated in 1986 and the following year former player Jimmy Hill had to step in to save the club.
That was not enough however to prevent Fulham falling down to the fourth tier by 1994, where they stayed until 1997.
The Mohamed Al-Fayed era
Fulham were purchased by Mohamed Al-Fayed for £6.25m at the end of the 1996/97 season, with Al-Fayed promising the future would be prosperous at the club. He fulfilled his promise, as with Kevin Keegan in charge the club were able to return to the second tier.
It was under Jean Tigana that The Cottagers were able to return to the Premier League, earning their fifth promotion in just 5 years.
The Whites achieved a 13th place finish in their first season in the Premier League, which also saw them lift the Intertoto Cup after beating Bologna 5-3 over two legs in the final, also reaching the UEFA Cup Third Round.
Apart from finishing 9th in the 2003/2004 season, many years of struggling to remain in the Premier League followed, namely the great escape season in which Roy Hodgson managed to achieve what had previously looked impossible, going on a fantastic run with The Cottagers to help them survive on the final day of the season.
The next season under Hodgson was Fulham’s most successful ever, finishing seventh and securing a place in the UEFA Europa League.
Fulham went on a magical run in the 2008/9 season in the Europa League, knocking out the likes of Juventus, VFL Wolfsburg and Hamburger SV on their way to the final, where they could only be stopped by a stoppage time winner against Atletico Madrid.
By 2013 however, the club was sold to Shahid Khan, when the club’s fortunes began to turn.
The fight to secure Premier League status
In 2014 Fulham were relegated back to the Championship, with three managers all unable to keep the club in the top flight.
What followed was a struggle to return to the Premier League, which, when achieved by Slaviša Jokanović in 2018 after a play-off final win against Aston Villa, was only short lived, with Fulham being relegated the season after.
A similar pattern has followed at the club since, with managers taking Fulham up to the Premier League, only to be relegated the season after.
Last season, Marco Silva managed to take Fulham back to the Premier League, winning the league with 90 points, with top goal scorer Aleksandar Mitrović netting an impressive 43 times for The Cottagers.
Silva now has the task of ensuring that Fulham can survive in the Premier League for the first time since 2013.