Last Updated: Sun, 25 Nov 2012 13:52
Fulham boss Martin Jol feels his side were "bullied" by Stoke in the first half of Saturday's 1-0 defeat at the Britannia Stadium.
The Staffordshire outfit have long been associated with a direct, physical approach in matches and it was something Jol thought his men struggled to deal with in an opening period during which they fell behind to Charlie Adam's 26th-minute strike.
The manager said he had spoken to his players beforehand about Stoke's capacity to "bully" opponents, but stressed he was not about to criticise the home side's tactics. Asked if he felt Fulham had allowed themselves to be bullied in the first half, Jol said: "Yes.
"We knew that and we said it before the game - they try to bully teams and they bullied us. You have to get them on the back foot and then play your football in their half.
"Then they will probably not be as good as they looked - but we couldn't do that in the first half.
"In the second half we did, but we needed a lot of forward players to try to create that - with Dimitar Berbatov, Mladen Petric, Ashkan Dejagah and (substitutes) Hugo Rodallega and Damien Duff. But it was disappointing that we still couldn't score."
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