Soccer Football - Premier League - Crystal Palace v Fulham - Selhurst Park, London, Britain - November 9, 2024 Fulham's Emile Smith Rowe celebrates scoring their first goal Action Images via Reuters/John Sibley
(Reuters) - Emile Smith Rowe has been a man on a mission at Fulham this season as he looks to make up for lost time when his career stalled at Arsenal, and the midfield playmaker has lit up the pitch in the white kit, making the Craven Cottage fans dream.
Once heralded as the heir worthy of wearing the iconic number 10 kit at Arsenal, Smith Rowe struck up a lethal partnership with Bukayo Saka as Mikel Arteta's revolution began to take shape before injuries derailed the midfielder's career.
Smith Rowe scored 11 goals in the 2021-22 season but groin surgery kept him out for most of the following season. Martin Odegaard's rise to captain and first name on the team sheet was the final nail in the coffin of Smith Rowe's career at Arsenal.
With no hope of breaking into Arsenal's starting line-up, Smith Rowe jumped at the opportunity to move across London when Fulham signed him for an initial fee of 27 million pounds ($34.89 million), which could rise to 34 million with add-ons.
Fulham had not finished above 10th since their return to the top flight in 2022 and manager Marco Silva was adamant that the club should pay the fee to recruit the 24-year-old as he went about rebuilding the squad.
"Sometimes the most expensive ones are the players that don't play (well) or they don't perform. There was a big effort from us as a club (to sign him), we knew him so well and we had a small chance to fight to have him here," Silva said.
"I told our board that we have to go with everything that we can because we needed a player like him -- clear and more creative in that pocket area, a player that arrives in the box."
Smith Rowe needed little time to establish himself at Fulham and adapted easily with his former Arsenal team mates such as Bernd Leno, Alex Iwobi and Reiss Nelson also at the club.
He quickly became a key figure in Fulham's midfield by unlocking defences with ease while also showing he had an eye for goal -- just as he did at Arsenal -- receiving standing ovations when he was substituted.
On Saturday, his determined pressing yielded Fulham the opening goal in a 2-0 win at Crystal Palace while he could have had a brace if not for a lengthy VAR check for offside where he was off by mere millimetres.
He has three goals and two assists so far, propelling Fulham up to seventh, and Silva said he would only score more.
"He's a player that is going to score more throughout the season, I don't have doubts. He's going to improve, he's going to be in better shape every single game that he's going to play," Silva added.
"He's a lovely kid, he's a lovely boy. He wants to learn, he wants to improve and he's going to be a top, top player. He's already a really good player. It's so nice to have a talent like him to work with."
($1 = 0.7739 pounds)
(Reporting by Rohith Nair in Bengaluru; editing by Clare Fallon)
