Marco Silva wants Fulham to move on from cup meltdown and focus on Bournemouth

Marco Silva wants Fulham to put their Old Trafford meltdown behind them and get their European dream back on track.

The Cottagers were beating Manchester United in their FA Cup tie a fortnight ago when 60 seconds of madness cost them a place in the semi-final.

After Willian was sent off for handball, Aleksandar Mitrovic was red-carded for shoving referee Chris Kavanagh and Silva was also dismissed.

While Silva and Mitrovic await further punishment from the Football Association, the Portuguese coach wants to draw a line under the incident and focus on Saturday’s Premier League trip to Bournemouth.

“We have to apologise – not just the situation with Chris Kavanagh, but to all the fans, our fans, the people that love football,” he said.

“Because after such a good performance from ourselves in that 72 minutes, where we were at a really good level, that moment and that incident made a huge impact in the game.

“Bournemouth will be a tough, tough, tough game to play, I’m 100 per cent sure. We are talking about a tough place to go always.

“We know that they are really fighting to get out of the position they’re in, and they have achieved some good results.

“In the last few games they have been a really difficult team to beat, against any team in this league in the last few games. We know that they lost their last game, like we did as well, and we want to show a reaction, like they will.

“They did well in the January market as well, some players came and improved them, gave them more solutions in the attack line.

“They are strong, not just the players who are going to start, even when they have to change something from the bench they have the solutions now to have an impact in the game.

“We played against them last season in the Championship as well, they were always competitive matches. This season at Craven Cottage was the same, a really competitive match, and it will be the same on Saturday.”

Fulham sit ninth in the Premier League having drawn one and lost two of their last three outings but are just three points behind sixth-placed Liverpool.

And Silva is confident the display at Old Trafford is a sign his side are on the right track.

Silva added: “We have to be at our best level. After the Arsenal and Brentford (defeats), the level of our performance improved clearly for the Manchester United match.

“The motivation and desire was there, and I saw big improvements from the previous games. And it’s important for us to keep those standards, to play at our best level.”