2024 may well go down as the year of Rodrigo Muniz in the eyes of Fulham fans; imagine predicting that on New Year’s Eve.
As Muniz celebrated the New Year, he can’t have possibly imagined becoming the Premier League’s in-form striker before April.
Muniz had made just eight Premier League appearances from August to the end of December.
Those appearances amounted to just 316 minutes of action and he went without a goal in that run too.
Few really thought Muniz would explode into life in 2024 but he has been simply sensational in recent weeks.
Saturday’s acrobatic leveller in the 3-3 draw at Sheffield United was Muniz’s eighth goal in his last eight Premier League games.
Muniz just can’t stop scoring, taking himself from the Fulham bench to being almost undroppable right now.
Maybe this is just a purple patch, maybe Muniz has really unlocked his potential, but it’s clear that Marco Silva knew this could happen.
Marco Silva on Rodrigo Muniz decision
Some may have wondered if Muniz would be going out on loan again, shaving spent last season with Middlesbrough.
Instead, it was another Brazilian striker who left Fulham on a temporary basis with Carlos Vinicius heading to Galatasaray.
Vinicius only started two Premier League games before moving to Turkey and has now started just once since that switch.
Speaking to The Athletic after Saturday’s draw at Sheffield United, Silva admitted that it was pretty much a decision between loaning out Muniz or Vinicius.
Silva claims that the choice was made ‘straight away’, believing that Muniz had the ability to go on the goalscoring run we are now witnessing.
Silva pointed to Muniz’s work in pre-season, leaving the Fulham boss to have a lasting feeling that he should be kept around.
“I sat down and had a conversation with him in May (last year), and decided he needed to do pre-season with us,“ said Silva. “We gave him a plan for the summer. And in the first week of pre-season we could see, OK, Rodrigo was here to fight. There have been some ups and downs with injuries, but we never felt it was time for him to go.
“We decided if one of the strikers needed to go it was decided straight away to be Carlos (Vinicius) as we felt that one day things will click for Rodrigo. Now he has had his chance and is showing his quality, all credit to him.”
Vinicius was sent off to Turkey and and Silva’s faith in Muniz is paying off, probably even more than Silva would have imagined.
Fulham must still attempt to work out if Muniz’s form can be long-lasting, but he has made the January addition of Armando Broja almost pointless.
Whilst Broja is heading back to Chelsea this summer, Muniz is Fulham’s to keep – and he could yet kick on even further after hitting this outstanding run of form.