John Collins is not happy as Fulham replace Jokanovic with Ranieri

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Premier League bottom club Fulham have taken the shock decision to sack Slavisa Jokanovic and bring Claudio Ranieri to Craven Cottage.

You can see the logic behind Fulham owner Shahid Khan’s decision to sack Slavisa Jokanovic and hire Claudio Ranieri.

Throughout his storied managerial career, Ranieri has adopted a traditionally old-school, Italian style with his success at various clubs – including Chelsea, Roma and of course Leicester City – built on a solid back line.

And this bodes well for a Fulham side who have looked frankly absurd in defence in the opening 12 games of the current campaign. The Cottagers have been breached a remarkable 31 times already and they are bottom of the Premier League after seven defeats in a row.

Speaking to talkSPORT (14 November, 10.30am), former Fulham midfielder John Collins clearly thinks that Ranieri has a challenge on his hands, and believes Jokanovic has paid the price for the club’s questionable recruitment.

“I’m bitterly disappointed. They were like the Man City of the Championship and I said at the time when they brought in all the new players ‘this isn’t going to work’,” Collins said.

“I have no doubt that the team that won the Championship is better than the team at this current time. Recruitment has been the problem, you’ve got to get that right and Fulham haven’t.

“But boards panic, they’ve taken a gamble because I think (Jokanovic) is a good manager.”

Fulham famously spent over £100 million in a hectic transfer window but the vast majority of their big-money additions, in particular Jean-Michel Seri, Andre-Franck Zambo Anguissa and Maxime Le Marchand, have struggled to live up to their price-tags in their first Premier League season.

Collins adds that Ranieri could find it very difficult to replicate his success at Leicester with the current crop of Fulham players.

“His success at Leicester came from counter-attacking but that can’t happen with Fulham because Aleksandar Mitrovic has got no pace,” he added. “You can’t play that style unless you’ve got pace.”