Rise of a Football God

In Selhurst Park, Fulham and Crystal Palace clashed.

As soon as the referee's whistle went off, Fulham kicked off the game.

From the beginning, a team full of Fulham youngsters surged, determined to prove their ability as they took the game to Crystal Palace.

They wanted to score an early goal.

During the early proceedings of this game, Fulham was the one holding the advantage over their opponents as despite playing at home, Crystal Palace were forced to defend against them.

For almost 3 minutes after the start of this game, Fulham retained possession, pinging passes around with Andreas Pereira at its core.

They got themselves into a few dangerous positions, Muniz coming closest as his low-driven shot beat the Crystal Palace goalkeeper only to hit the post and rebound back into the Crystal Palace 6-yard box.

Before Muniz could pounce, Lacroix did, clearing the ball up field.

Bam!

While almost the full Crystal Palace players went back to defend against Fulham's relentless attack, a certain player stayed up top and now as soon as the ball was cleared up field, he reacted.

As soon as Mateta reacted, Diop did the same thing as he tried to keep the imposing striker in check but the massive Mateta beat him for strength, shoving him aside with his shoulder as he tried to control the ball.

Bam!

But it was a miss-control, Mateta's touch was too heavy as the ball hit his leg and accelerated past him towards Fulham's 18-yard box.

The imposing striker pursued, but another Fulham player also reacted.

When the ball was cleared up field, Bernd Leno could only hope on his defender to stop the rampaging Mateta but when he could not, he already expected the worst… till that poor touch.

"…!" This goalkeeper immediately felt like an electricity charge was just passed through his brain, and his body reacted instinctively.

He charged out of his area, chasing after the ball to clear it the sweeper goalkeeper style.

For a few moments, time seemed to freeze in Selhurst Park as 2 players chased after the same ball from opposite sides, but…, Mateta was faster.

The imposing striker had more distance to cover to the ball, and the fact that the ball was moving away from him made him disadvantaged but still, his long legs rapidly ate yards of space like they were not there.

Thud! Thud!

The home fans watched with bated breaths.

"And ohhhh! He's done it, Mateta arrives first!"

Knowing that he would lose the racing contest, Bernd Leno made his body big, sliding forward but the intelligent striker predicted his actions.

With a delicate flick, Mateta raised the ball above and past the sprawling Bernd Leno as he also jumped past him.

With that, the last Fulham player was eliminated.

Mateta had a free goal to himself!

Not playing with his food, Mateta hit it one time as the ball rolled into the net without resistance, and then Selhurst Park exploded.

"GOALLLLL…!"

This striker jogged towards the corner flag, jumped and pumped a fist in the air in celebration as he rode the energy of the home fans.

In just the 4th minute of this game, Fulham started trailing.

When the referee's whistle sounded again to continue play, both sides finally settled into the game, locking it up completely.

Defensive excellence was the watchword for this game as both defenses stayed on top of their game under pressure, excellently thwarting the offensive players, leaving them toothless.

At first, Fulham tried to chase the equalizer until they could no longer chase.

In the end, this was a heavily rotated team compared to Crystal Palace's strong lineup. The experience and ability of the Crystal Palace players started kicking in as the game wore on, granting them dominion over the game.

During the late stages of the first half, they dominated, threatening to score again and again as Fulham were forced to desperately defend their goal.

The first half eventually ended 1-0 with Crystal Palace leading.

During half-time, a dissatisfied Coach Marco Silva gave his players an absolute verbal dressing down before sending them back to the pitch without changes. He hoped for his words to kickstart a fire inside them.

At first, it seemed to work after the second half started as Fulham erupted, taking the game to the Crystal Palace half to exert their authority.

This only stayed for like 10 minutes though, after, exhaustion kicked in again as Crystal Palace regained their domination.

The home fans were absolutely enjoying what they were seeing as their extremely loud noise slowly buoyed their team to victory.

In the 70th minute with nothing changing, Coach Marco Silva was finally fed up as he pulled the plug in the game.

He used all 3 of his subs, introducing Alex Iwobi, Emile Smith Rowe, and Calvin Bassey to add some fire and backbone to his team.

As soon as all 3 players entered the game in the 70th minute, the game visibly changed as Fulham became much more threatening. With Diop's original partner in crime back, the defense was also much more solid.

They took their time to settle into the game before beginning to wrestle for authority over the game, and then they succeeded.

BAM!

Alex Iwobi came closest, unleashing a thunderous outside the box shot in the 76th minute that hit the post.

In the 78th minute, after a mazy dribble, cutting through Crystal Palace players, Emile Smith Rowe squeezed a short in that beat Dean Henderson only for Crystal Palace to be saved by a stupendous Marc Guehi goal line clearance.

The Englishman grabbed his head, screaming in frustration.

The God of luck seemed to have abandoned Fulham today as they kept trying with no results to show, and in the 85th minute, they were punished again.

Having been substituted into the game at some point, Eddie Nketiah, the ex-Arsenal forward finally sent a dagger through Fulham fans around the world as he scored a solo goal in the 85th minute to seal this game.
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At a certain hospital, a certain patient truly felt like his heart stopped beating.

"GOALLLLL…!" Selhurst Park erupted again.

The Fulham squad dissolved into chaos as they started arguing between themselves on the pitch, pointing fingers.

When the chaos eventually stopped and the referee's whistle sounded again, the fire in Fulham died.

They played the rest of the game meekly, surrendering to their opponents.

When the final whistle was blown by the referee, Crystal Palace won 2-0, progressing to the semifinal of the EFL Cup.

Palace caused a major upset. Despite Sam's absence, a lot of fans still expected the reigning EFL Cup champions to progress further in the competition.

Fulham truly had fallen.