Fulham 6 : 2 Birmingham City

What have Fulham FC got in common with Romanian tennis player Sorana Cirstea? Until yesterday, very little it would seem.

But as Fulham rounded off their second successive 6-2 win, Cirstea was causing a minor upset in Australia defeating the 20th seed Petra Kvitova 6-2 6-2 in the Australian open.

Kvitova did not win two successive games. Birmingham did not score two successive goals. Cirstea did win five successive games and indeed Fulham stormed from 1-2 down to 6-2 up by doing the same against Bristol City.

The Romanian needed only 71 minutes to upset the seed from the Czech Republic. It was pretty much all over at Craven Cottage when Fabio Carvalho put Fulham 5-2 up in the 75th minute.

Cirstea narrowed her career record against Kvitova to within one, with four wins and five losses while Fulham closed their historical record against Birmingham to 33 wins and 34 losses.

Cirstea’s highest ever world ranking was 21st. Fulham are currently 21st in the English league structure.

Cirstea was born 31 years ago in Bucharest and at this point, the comparisons do get slightly more difficult!

Fulham had already scored 13 goals in their last two games before Tuesday’s kick off.

They did not take long to start breaking more records. The first goal was actaully converted by Barnsley born City defender Marc Roberts in ten minutes, but had he not intervened, Kebano was waiting for a tap in.

Kebano himself, Carvalho and captain Tom Cairney also scored before the interval, although the game’s best goal fell to Bosnian Croat Ivan Sunjic on the stroke of halftime, to leave an interval scoreline of 4-1.

Soaring in Melbourne ?@sorana_cirstea upsets the Czech Kvitova for the second straight year at the #AusOpen. pic.twitter.com/tpWotK45Od

— wta (@WTA) January 18, 2022

Cairney’s goal was the product of the kind of passing move Scott Parker could only have dreamed about when he was there. The fluidity of the running led to City chasing shadows and hardly any blue shirt was close to intervening as most of the home side participated. The Scotsman’s side footed finisher was the gloss the painting deserved.

A half hour ‘goal drought’ followed before the excellent Carvalho secured the match with his second goal. Gary Gardner struck again for the visitors but the sixth goal went to a man who truly deserved the accolade.

USA international Antonee Robinson had tortured the City defence in the first half and his collaborative efforts with Kebano overwhelmed City. His long range effort, probablty every bit as good as Sunjic’s, drew a cartwheel celebration that perfectly matched the mood of the majority of the crowd,

Fulham are the first English side in 88 years to score 6+ goals in three consecutive league games. Also somewhat oddly, Aleksander Mitrovic was not among the scorers in any of the games.

Fulham manager Marco Silva noted that in his post game comments:

“Having four different scorers was pleasing. We have a fantastic goal-scorer and it is a good sign that we are able to score six goals even if our top scorer doesn’t score.

“Mitrovic didn’t score but was always involved in everything. He did very well tonight. Even though he didn’t score I am very happy with him. He is really happy. Of course he wants to score but he knows the main thing is the football club.

“Carvalho is a key player for us. He gave us very good things. It has been a season of up and downs for him and rumours around him that didn’t help but always I see the same commitment.”

Fulham now travel to Stoke this weekend. The Potters have two straight wins behind them but have secured just one point from their last four home league games, scoring just twice.

Back in Melbourne, Sorana Cirstea will now face Kristina Kucova of Slovakia in the second round. Kucova defeated Misaki Doi of Japan 6-3, 7-5 on Tuesday.

Anne-Marie Batson is the tennis commentator for the WTA tour on Amazon Prime Video Sport. She told Prost:

“This was a  flawless performance from Sorana Cirstea beating seeded player Petra Kvitova for the second straight year at the Australian Open.

“Cirstea had the answers to Kvitova’s game, didn’t allow her opponent to get into rhythm and capitalised on mistakes. A strong start to the Romanian’s grand slam campaign.”

The same could be said for Fulham’s 2022. They now have four straight wins having ended 2021 without a win in their last five games.

Like Fulham, however, Cirstea may carry the burden of expectations into her next match.

Kristina Kucova is ranked 96th in the world. Cirstea is ranked 38th. The two 31-year-olds have only met once before with the Romanian winning in 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, in the Shenzhen Open in January 2017.

As they progress though, titans loom.

Fulham go to the Etihad in February to face Manchester City in the FA Cup. There are a host of seeds above Cirstea left in the Australian Open including her compatriot Simona Halep and Number One ranked Ashleigh Barty.

Garbine Muguruza, Barbora Krejcikova and Iga Swiatek have all won Grand Slams but so had Petra Kvitova – twice at Wimbledon. Also eliminated however are two other Grand Slam winners Sofia Kenin and Angelique Kerber.

Swiatek, seeded 7, is the strongest seed left in Section 7 where Cirstea is drawn. Cirstea, should she win, faces either Australian Samantha Stosur, riding a wave of emotion in her last tournament or the Russian Anastsia Pavlyuchenkova.

Fulham host Blackpool between Stoke and Manchester City.

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