Staying humble, it really does feel like a normal February at Selhurst. If you forget 2025 for a moment, the glory, the glow, the passion, the noise and the trophy cabinet, February 2026 feels actually not much different to February 2024:
- Steve’s hunting a new Head Coach
- The squad is wildly unbalanced
- We’re looking over our shoulders at relegation
- Chances are hard to create
- There’s nothing much harder than winning at home
Now we look like we have no strategy.
Silent Steve, Noisy Ollie – and they’re both naked!
As expected, the window saw owners’ masks drop with some questionable recruitment, but we didn’t think they would expose themselves completely. There’s no guarantee even that the £65million spent in the January window was on-budget. Was the real spend supposed to be much, much lower? After all, Clickbait repeatedly reported that Palace spent the entire window offering pricey players for sale.
Still, if you knew when the transfer window opened that your net budget was £65million, would you really splurge it all on loaning in one forward and breaking club transfer records to bring in two more forwards, while totally ignoring team needs elsewhere? No ready-now centre back? No right wing back? No leaders?
And what does Steve Parish say now?
Well, Steve is usually silent. Through a window where spending smashed the club transfer record – twice! And through the Oliver Glasner Show … until Glasner says let me go. And Clickbait tells us Steve says ….. no, let’s all watch you work your notice, eh? What’s the strategy here?
With pantomime season over, the Oliver Glasner Show did come as a shock. His mask crashed to the floor with his not-leaving-yet departure announcement, taking him from London tourist attraction to sewage complaint in only 9 months. Now, with each press conference, Glasner exposes himself more and more. And, by taking out his frustration on Palace fans, he’s crossed red lines.
He wants out, to have some time at home with the family perhaps before he jets off to his next assignment. He’s got one foot out the Selhurst door and suddenly it feels like he only has one song. Working your notice is a pain that lasts till you leave – as the days tick by, it just feels worse. So Glasner’s naked period feels like a running sore that only Steve Parish can or will heal.
Yet the writing was always on the wall
Glasner’s CV two Februarys back announced what he would do if he wasn’t given the backing he felt he’d earned. The repeat pattern was obvious in his CV – he gets a job, he gives it everything for up to 2 years, he looks for owner support, if it’s not forthcoming, he kicks up a stink and off he goes. He did it in both his previous jobs. And, although he succeeded in substantially improving both Wolfsburg and Frankfurt in his two-year stays, Glasner is not a universally positive memory at either.
So Parish knew what came next, but still never really had the answers Ollie needed or, for his performance and results, definitely deserved.
Apart from that, Steve says pretty much nothing?
Ahhhh, the Sweet Mystery of Crystal Palace Strategy
Two windows, Marc Guehi was up for sale, yet no replacement was ever found. Instead, we have Chadi Riad and Jaydee Canvot, and – while both look to have buckets of potential – Guehi left enormous boots to fill.
Early December, another on-pitch leader, Jean-Philippe Mateta, made his intended departure public knowledge, yet 2 months later in the final week of the window, Palace were still scrabbling around for a replacement so the player could get his way. Instead, JPM is still a Palace player, but not first choice, not happy, a frustrated Frenchman with a reputation for wobbly knees and a reduced transfer value. How very sad.
Unfortunately, those are not the only strategy questions that fans have now. Clickbait says we tried to flog Eddie Nketiah to West Ham, so he’s another Palace player with that “working your notice” feeling. Christantus Uche too. Nathanial Clyne, Jefferson Lerma, and Daichi Kamada will be out of contract this summer, and it seems all three may go. Contracts for Chris Richards, Tyrick Mitchell, and Will Hughes will all have just 12 months to run. And the form of big stars like Adam Wharton, Daniel Munoz, and Yeremy Pino has taken a sudden simultaneous dive. Ismaila Sarr, the AFCON winner, has yet to rediscover his full speed and trickery, leaving Dean Henderson often exposed and vulnerable but standing strong as the new captain and undoubted leader. We’re lucky to have him.
Some gaps in the squad this summer will clearly have to be filled from the Academy. The teen talents we saw at Selhurst against KuPS were really impressive. Kids of school age were good enough to be in a team that beat the Finnish champions over 45 minutes, but understandably not the full 90. Missed chances came back that night to haunt us again. But the experience must have done Drakes-Thomas, King, Benamar and Rodney a world of good.
For a football club to succeed, everyone has to really want to be there
The unity at Wembley still sends shivers down the spine, but Palace failed to build on that magic. If Steve Parish’s immediate words and actions don’t recapture that special feeling, we will all have to live with the consequences.
See? This really is starting to feel just like our old, comfy identity. Normal service at the Palace. We’re out of both cups, we’re shaky in the league and needed slices of luck to win at home against the bottom club. Can Glasner and the team still achieve in Europe? We’ll soon know.
In Europe, Glasner is now key
Now he’s established that he’s a loose cannon in charge of a Premier League club with frequent press conferences and no punishment possible for anything he says or does, will Glasner act responsibly? Can fans expect him now to do all in his power to win the Conference League?
Or will Steve call time and bring in a new Head Coach sooner than the summer? The main names in the frame seem to be Gareth, bless him, if he’d never played for Palace, would he ever make the list? Then it’s just-fired Thomas Frank (but it was only Spurs), Robbie Keane, Brendan Rogers and Roberto De Zerbi, as well as foreign coaches with zero Premier League knowhow, hmmm, Jose Bordalas, Inigo Perez and Roger Schmidt. As Glasner and Iraola have shown, places like Palace can be a perfect Premier League starting point for a coach with zero experience and low profile in England. But it’s only ever a launch pad, not a destination.
Even when communicating, Steve can stay silent
The new Head Coach will of course be selected by Steve Parish. I always want to praise Steve, so why are there so many reasons to wish he’d do it differently? Although he does at least provide some certainties….. he’s evidently single minded on what’s best for Palace, he clearly doesn’t care if feathers are ruffled, and for Palace fans, his work will customarily be done in silence. Because, even when Steve speaks, he’s often silent.
For example, his message to fans in the programme for Spurs at home at the culmination of the greatest calendar year in the club’s history. Two major trophies, a top-six league record and reaching the knockout stages of a major European tournament, yet at the time surrounded by several real uncertainties and the team bang out of form.
Steve had a golden opportunity to love the fans, explain the plan, 8 paragraphs on the most amazing 12 months and Palace fan could ever dream up, And what did Silent Steve say? Nothing we didn’t know already!
So, enjoy these moments as much as you can!
The future doesn’t feel safe. We know, Palace don’t need to win every match, we don’t need to dream any more because we remember how it actually looks, feels and sounds when Palace win big trophies. And it’s only four months since Palace were FA Cup holders, on a Carabao Cup run, top four in the Premier League, winning matches in Europe, and playing exciting, incisive football that won match after match. My sole remaining question is this – with so much potential, do we have to accept that that was our only moment?
