McDonald: My block was just part and parcel of football

Kevin McDonald described his last-ditch tackle against Derby County that ensured all three points went back to Craven Cottage as just 'doing his job'.

The vice-captain's brilliant tackle denied Cameron Jerome in the dying minutes of the game - a tackle that ensured Fulham leapfrogged their opponents into 4th place having come away with a hard-fought victory at Pride Park that made it 13 games ubeaten.

Marcus Bettinelli was also on hand to claw away a last-second attempt, but McDonald was modest about the brilliance of the tackle, saying it's just part and parcel of football.

He said: “Fredericks himself said he switched off and didn’t realise the guy was behind, I think everyone thought it was going out but I knew that Jerome had that pace to get there.

Derby 1-2 Fulham

“As he went to get it I thought ‘they’re in here if he cuts this back’ and I just made a last ditch challenge, it’s one of those things that’s part and parcel of football, that’s my job at the end of the day and I’m just glad we got the three points.”

That result has seen Fulham come through a tough period in their fixture calendar with the scalps of three promotion rivals in Wolves, Aston Villa and Derby - a set of fixtures some were looking at as 'season-defining' for the club.

It's now 10 points from those four games, but with Sheffield United and Preston North End to come it doesn't get any easier.

However, McDonald believes those results have been 'massive' and pinpointed the wins before this set of results as the foundation for the run that Fulham are on.

“It’s been massive, and we still have two left from the so-called run of six that we had," he added.

“We’ve taken ten points from the four games, that;s a great return, there’s no denying it, it’s been a great run but it doesn’t stop there, we have to go again Tuesday and win, it’s as simple as that.

“You feel like you’re going to get a bit of a rest-bite but you don’t and we go Tuesday which will be a really hard game and we’ve got to get three points again.

“I think it is [season defining], but also the part of it before where we played the so-called lower down teams, we picked up some good points there.

“There were some tough games and we picked up good points and now we’ve just continued on that run, we’re on that run now and hopefully it doesn’t stop anytime soon.”

Fulham are no strangers to how difficult going to Pride Park can be - last season the Rams beat them 4-2 in a run where the Cottagers looked unstoppable.

But this time around, McDonald thinks Fulham silenced the Derby crowd and surprised their opponents with the fluid football those that watch the side week-in, week-out enjoy on a regular basis.

He said: “I think it’s always one of the best atmospheres in the Championship is coming here, especially when they’re ahead, it’s tough to play against.

“But we silenced the crowd a bit and they’ve been on a bit of a bad run recently so we managed to silence them to a certain extent.

“We put on some fantastic football in the first half, there’s no denying it, first touch football throughout the team and I think they were a bit surprised at how fluid we played.

“Second half they changed a bit, it was really hard but it was such a bonus going in at half time at 2-0.”

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