Our latest addition to the writing team here at TEB HQ is Jamie Lawrence who, in his debut article for us, shares his passion for the club and touches on a fantastic few years in SE25.
Whether you are a Crystal Palace fan or not, you will understand the emotion you feel supporting your football team. The highs, the lows, and with Palace especially, the occasional threat of financial ambiguity and extinction.
The sheer roller-coaster ride that us Palace fans have been on, especially in these last five years, has meant that many of our lives are considerably shorter as a result. Whether it be the heart wrenching circumstances of our administration, to the elation of the Kevin Phillips penalty that sealed our promotion.
You cannot put a price on feelings like those, and we feel them much more than most fans of other clubs, which I personally think is all part of the fun of supporting the Palace.
However, there comes a time when things change, and sometimes that can be for the better, and other times it is for the worse. Football fans are all too familiar with both.
An example of one is the meteoric rise of Swansea City. Not that long ago they were at the very bottom of the Football League. Sadly, another example is the demise of Blackpool, a proud club steeped in history (despite them copying Glad All Over!) who have suffered because of neglectful, selfish ownership.
At Palace, during the era in which I have been a supporter, we are used to the latter, whether it is losing our star players to bigger clubs or financial struggles. We seemed to be the unfortunate, mediocre side who never really had a hope of achieving anything other than a mid-table Championship finish, which in the grand scheme of things, is not particularly glamorous or entertaining.
Events aside from the football often overshadowed a team that frequently punched above their weight in the league and in other competitions too. In 2010 it seemed all hope was lost, and despite CPFC2010 taking control at the eleventh hour, there was little chance of Palace revelling in success like we had done in the past. Well, before I was born!
However, in 2011, we saw a glimpse of what was to come. A merely average Championship club from the depths of South London, with a little known up and coming manager, rose to fame overnight after famously beating Sir Alex Fergusons Manchester United at Old Trafford in a Carling Cup Quarter Final.
It was not the game that caught the eye of the discerning football fan either because, to be fair, apart from THAT goal, Palace spent the majority of the game on the back foot. No, it was the fans that surprised everyone.
The constant singing, chanting, dancing, and the sheer emotion and elation when those goals went in. At the final whistle, the realisation that we had beaten the Champions sunk in. An image that springs to my mind is of a Palace fan, holding his two young children, one in each arm, and all three of them were crying. For once, they were tears of joy!
Despite that result, we still finished in the lower end of the Championship that season, and we all thought that was the best thing we would see from Palace for some time. How wrong could we have been?
The next season, despite a shaky start, we surged up the table, thanks to the timely signings of Damien Delaney, Yannick Bolasie and Andre Moritz. Even with the departure of Dougie Freedman as manager, we surged on, and not long after that we were in the promotion fold.
We all know what happened next, and it is a memory that will stay with me for the rest of my life. Being matched with our arguably stronger rivals in the play off semi-finals, and in the first leg, losing our star striker to injury. It all seemed so, well… Palace.
However, a dazzling display from the departing Wilfried Zaha saw two goals banged into the Brighton net, and the typical Palace ambitious but rubbish stereotype smashed to smithereens!
We all know about our two recent Premiership seasons. There is no reason for me to cover either of them other than to briefly admire the sheer team spirit of the side to pull off the seemingly impossible. Not once, but twice, not to mention two miraculous periods of management.
The departure of Tony Pulis was a small reversal back to the Palace of old, because of the exciting build up to the season, only for our hearts to be broken right at the moment we all thought we were making progress.
The underwhelming appointment of a charismatic but incapable Neil Warnock did nothing to make things better, and it was the fans turn to once again think ‘Oh no, here we go again’.
The turnaround under Alan Pardew after Christmas was fantastic, and some ‘maverick’ performances from the players (yes, I just had to use that word somewhere in here!) saw us finish in the top ten, our highest ever finish since the Premier League was established in 1992.
That was some season. Despite the hard work on the pitch and the increased media coverage of the team, it is still our special, wonderful fans who take a lot of plaudits because of their dedication and passion, mixed with a little bit of banter, which saw them named best fans in the league both in 2013/14 and 2014/15.
That is what really makes our club exciting. We do not just over achieve on the pitch, but off of it too. We may be vastly outnumbered when compared to the global fan base of the big teams, but we certainly more than make up for it.
So here’s to you, the famous red and blue. The owners, the players, the staff and most importantly, to you, the fans. Here’s to more success, more heartbreak, more highs, lows and financial woes, because without them, it just wouldn’t be Palace. I don’t know about you, but I think that is what makes supporting them special.
Thank you for reading, as you can probably see, I am a new writer for The Eagles Beak, and I would really appreciate your feedback on this article on Twitter – just click on the icon below. Enjoy your summer. UP THE PALACE!
