Alex Iwobi of Fulham. Photo by IMAGO
Nigerian playmaker Alex Iwobi hit two significant milestones despite Fulham succumbing to a thrilling 3-2 defeat to West Ham at the London Stadium on Friday night, Soccernet.ng reports.
Iwobi delivered a stellar individual performance, scoring both of Fulham’s goals.
However, costly errors from teammates Andreas Pereira and Bernd Leno gifted Carlos Soler and Lucas Paquetá goals, while Tomáš Souček also found the net for West Ham in Graham Potter’s Premier League debut as the Hammers’ manager.
The Hammers seized control of the match just past the half-hour mark with two quickfire goals in 131 seconds. Soler and Souček capitalised on Fulham’s defensive lapses to put West Ham firmly in the driver’s seat.
Fulham halved the deficit early in the second half when Iwobi’s dangerous cross eluded everyone, including goalkeeper Łukasz Fabiański, and found the back of the net in the 51st minute. However, another defensive blunder allowed Paquetá to restore West Ham’s two-goal cushion in the 67th minute.
Iwobi struck again in the 78th minute, delivering a near-identical goal to his first. His cross once more bypassed the West Ham defense and slipped past Fabiański, with Harry Wilson narrowly missing a touch.
Alex Iwobi has now scored more Premier League goals for Fulham than he has for any other side.
Iwobi’s brace brought his Premier League tally for Fulham to 12 goals in just 51 appearances, surpassing the 11 league goals he managed during 100 games with Arsenal and the six he scored across 123 matches for Everton.
His seven league goals this season also mark a career-best for Iwobi, surpassing the five he recorded in 30 games last season.
Additionally, Iwobi has climbed to seventh on the all-time list of Nigerian goal-scorers in Premier League history, with 29 goals.
He has overtaken Victor Anichebe (27 goals) and Obafemi Martins (28 goals). However, he remains some distance behind Peter Odemwingie (37 goals), Nwankwo Kanu (54 goals), and Yakubu Aiyegbeni (95 goals).
Marco Silva Reacts to Fulham’s Mistakes
After the match, Fulham manager Marco Silva rued his team’s errors.
Speaking to Sky Sports, Silva said: “We are penalized by our own mistakes, and it is clear it is our fault that we lost the game. We created enough chances to have been in front, and West Ham weren’t around our box at all.
“We made a mistake in our build-up, which led to their second goal. We lost our principle for a few minutes. They played defensively in the second half, but we then gave another goal away. Raul [Jiménez] and Adama [Traoré] had two big chances to equalize, so the result doesn’t reflect what happened on the pitch. But we cannot make it so easy for a team to punish us.”
Fulham will aim to bounce back when they travel to the King Power Stadium to face Leicester City on Saturday.