Relieved Arbeloa praises his Fulham team after deserved win over slumping Hull

Alvaro Arbeloa believes Fulham finally got what they deserved after Alex Iwobi’s first-half goal was enough to beat Hull and secure their first Premier League victory of the season.

The Cottagers started the day as one of three winless teams in the top-flight – Bournemouth and Tottenham the others – but got off the mark to move out of the bottom three.

Iwobi’s goal came from some poor Hull defending with the Tigers twice failing to clear their lines, enabling the former Everton midfielder to shoot past Konstantinos Tzolakis, via a deflection off Lucas Herrington.

Fulham were good value for the win with the only blemish coming late on when Ryan Sessegnon was sent-off for a poor challenge on Robinio Vaz.

Arbeloa – Fulham win was overdue

The victory eases the pressure on boss Arbeloa but he felt his side were worthy winners.

He told BBC Match of the Day: “I am very happy, especially for the supporters, they deserve this win, for the players, they were looking for this victory and have been working so hard. We deserved it in other matches, but we couldn’t get it; today was finally the day. 

“We were having the same feeling as other matches, when we were controlling the game for long spells and having good chances but didn’t score. Our rivals punish our mistakes or take their chances, but today we were brilliant for 90 minutes. We controlled the game, had many chances and didn’t concede any clear chances to Hull, a very good team. They are tough to beat. We need to keep going and keep improving.

“We have so many players with talent who can score. They will have chances. Players from the bench will be so important for us too. We have many chances and we need to try to take them.”

Fulham go to Coventry next weekend before facing Crystal Palace in the EFL Cup.

“It’s a massive week because we have Coventry, then Palace,” said Arbeloa. “It won’t be easy, but we know how we need to play and compete, we have to be competitive in this league.”

Premier League 2026

England

#	Team	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Last 5
1	Manchester City	6	6	0	0	16	5	11	18	W W W W W
2	Arsenal	6	5	0	1	10	5	5	15	W L W W W
3	Brighton	6	4	1	1	18	5	13	13	W W W D L
4	Chelsea	7	4	1	2	17	13	4	13	W W L D L
5	Brentford	6	2	4	0	12	6	6	10	L D W D D
6	Everton	7	2	4	1	8	7	1	10	L D W D D
7	Leeds	6	2	3	1	8	5	3	9	L D W D D
8	Hull City	6	2	3	1	8	6	2	9	L D L D D
9	Liverpool	6	2	3	1	7	7	0	9	W L W D W
10	Ipswich	6	3	0	3	9	12	-3	9	L W L W L
11	Newcastle	6	2	2	2	10	13	-3	8	L W L D W
12	Crystal Palace	6	2	1	3	9	12	-3	7	W D L W L
13	Manchester United	6	1	3	2	9	9	0	6	D D L D W
14	Coventry	6	2	0	4	5	11	-6	6	W W L L L
15	Nottingham Forest	6	1	2	3	5	8	-3	5	L L W D D
16	Aston Villa	6	1	2	3	6	11	-5	5	D W L D L
17	Sunderland	6	1	1	4	6	12	-6	4	L L L D W
18	Bournemouth	6	0	3	3	7	13	-6	3	L L D D D
19	Tottenham	6	0	3	3	3	9	-6	3	D L D D L
20	Fulham	6	0	2	4	6	10	-4	2	W L D D L

• Position 1, 2, 3, 4 : Promotion – Champions League (League phase)
• Position 5 : Promotion – Europa League (League phase)
• Position 18, 19, 20 : Relegation – Championship

Fulham were much better than us – Hull boss Jakirovic

Hull defied expectations with a strong start to the season following promotion but have now failed to win any of their last five in the Premier League.

And boss Sergej Jakirovic had no arguments with the result. He said: “It’s easy to analyse this game; we were out of everything. Fulham were much better than us, in and out of possession, first and second balls, duels. It was men against boys. We didn’t show anything today. But we cannot change anything now.

“The performances of Fulham have been good; they should have more points. We knew it would be tough today. We were completely out of it.

“It was very frustrating, maybe we had some situations around the box but made wrong decisions. They were much more aggressive than us and could have scored more.”