On Tuesday night, television viewers in Britain and across the world watched as Gordon Brown resigned as Prime Minister.  In stepping down as the leader of the Labour party at their London headquarters, Mr Brown reminded those present of the maxim on the back of their membership cards: “By the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more together than we do alone.”

Twenty-four hours later, at the Nordbank Arena in Hamburg, the spirit behind the beleaguered former PM’s departing words was on display for all to see as Fulham took their Europa League Final against Atletico Madrid to extra time. After nineteen games played over a period of ten months, the west London club’s European adventure was finally halted late on Wednesday night when Diego Forlan struck a winner for their Spanish opponents with the clock showing 116 minutes.

When the disappointment of Wednesday night’s defeat recedes, Fulham’s achievement in reaching the final will remain. Their manager, Roy Hodgson, moulded a collection of experienced players into a unit formidable enough to have knocked out Juventus, Wolfsburg, Hamburg, and Shakhtar Donetsk. Fulham boast a talented squad of seasoned professionals – Damien Duff was a Premier League-winner with Chelsea before losing his way at Newcastle, Danny Murphy has tasted European success before with Liverpool, while Mark Schwarzer is among the top division’s most assured goalkeepers – but nobody expected the club to remain in the hunt for a European trophy for so long, and to brush aside former winners of the European Cup along the way.

Fulham’s success under Hodgson did not begin this season or even the year before, when the club finished seventh in the Premier League and qualified for Europe. The sixty-two-year-old coach succeeded Lawrie Sanchez at Craven Cottage in December 2007 with Fulham battling relegation and, after a difficult start to his reign, Hodgson kept the club in the Premier League with an inspired run of four wins from their last five games. After successfully avoiding the drop, Hodgson brought in gifted players from British clubs who, perhaps because of injury or perceived inconsistency in the past, arrived at Fulham with something to prove. Along with his domestic acquisitions, Hodgson used his extensive European football experience and bulging contacts book to bring in players from abroad too.

Of the eleven players who started for Fulham in Hamburg on Wednesday night, six were Hodgson purchases:  Schwarzer, Duff, Brede Hangeland, Zoltan Gera, Dickson Etuhu, and Bobby Zamora. However, this means that the other five who began the game were at the club back when they were battling to retain their top flight status. Chris Baird, Aaron Hughes, Paul Konchesky, Simon Davies, and Danny Murphy were all part of the struggling side that Hodgson inherited in December 2007, and yet he incorporated them into a team that was three minutes from a penalty shootout and, possibly, the first trophy of Fulham’s 131-year history. No wonder, then, that Hodgson’s ability to make good players better through clever coaching and careful nurturing has made some people wonder how such gifts might work if transferred to the England team in the future.

A word of caution though: the last couple of times that the Football Association appointed an English England manager on the basis of their coaching credentials alone, rather than their personality or media profile, the national side did not fare well. Graham Taylor hauled Watford from the Fourth Division to the top flight and on into Europe, while Steve McClaren took Middlesbrough to the UEFA Cup Final only four years ago, but in both men’s short-lived reigns England failed to qualify for a major tournament. The strength of common endeavour is not always enough. Circumstance and the performance of a key individual can, and will, play decisive roles at times. Fulham found this out on Wednesday night when confronted by Diego Forlan, and Gordon Brown learned it to his cost when Nick Clegg chose to align the Liberal Democrats with David Cameron’s Conservatives rather than the Labour party.