Fulham podcaster Sammy James has been sharing his thoughts on Cottagers midfielder Ruben Loftus-Cheek and his recent performances for the west London club.
This comes after James recently hosted the latest episode of The Athletic’s Fulham-themed podcast Fulhamish where he spoke about a number of topics concerning Scott Parker’s side.
On the subject of Loftus-Cheek, who played the full 90 minutes of Fulham’s recent 0-0 draw against Crystal Palace in the Premier League, James had this to say about the Englishman. (13.03)
He said: “There is an agenda against Loftus-Cheek and don’t get me wrong, I think he has had some shocking performances for us this season, but he is getting better and better and better, and he was at the heart of everything good [against Palace].
“The way he carries the ball, I think is tremendous. I think sometimes I wish he was a tad more adventurous, and I sometimes still think he goes for the safe option rather than having an attempt on goal or trying to play a kind of real defence-splitting pass, however, I just think is all-round play is contributing so much to us.”
Fulham signed Loftus-Cheek on a season-long loan deal from fellow Premier League side Chelsea back in October.
Since he arrived at Craven Cottage, the 25-year-old, who is currently valued at £21.6 million, has made 22 appearances for Scott Parker’s side, scoring just one goal in the process (per Transfermarkt).
TIF Thoughts on Sammy James’ comments on Loftus-Cheek…
Given how the midfielder managed to earn himself a decent match rating of 7.22/10 for his performance at Selhurst Park over the weekend, this shows that he can pull out a top performance for Fulham, despite the stalemate result.
Have you been satisfied with Loftus-Cheek's season so far?
Yes
No
However, with Loftus-Cheek having only managed to make 0.7 key passes per game with 27.4 overall passes per game, this suggests that he has some room for improvement in terms of getting involved in the midfield and making successful passes in our view.