Zaha Returns In Thriller As Palace Hand Defeat To West Ham

The fans were treated to a wonderful afternoon of entertainment in the sunshine as the Eagles turned on the style to make it four wins in six games under Hodgson.

TIME/ DATE/ VENUE

• 12.30pm
• 29th April 2023
• Selhurst Park, Holmesdale Road, London SE25 6PU

RESULT

Crystal Palace 4-3 West Ham United

PLAYER RATINGS

UNUSED SUBSTITUTES – 5 James TOMKINS, 8 Albert Sambi LOKONGA, 13 Vicente GUAITA, 14 Jean-Philippe MATETA, 19 Will HUGHES, 26 Chris RICHARDS, 44 Jairo RIEDEWALD

OPPOSITION LINE-UP

UNSED SUBSTITUTES – 10 Manuel LANZINI, 12 Flynn DOWNES, 13 Alphonse AREOLA, 24 Thilo KEHRER

TEB VERDICT

Forget the defending from corners for a moment, but were we not entertained at Selhurst Park? A blistering first half was reminiscent of a boxing match with each team taking turns to strike a blow with attack after attack. Thankfully, the Eagles reacted to going a go down early in brilliant fashion to go in at the break with the lead.

The victory was sealed by a somewhat fortunate penalty decision where Zaha handed the ball to Eze who dispatched with aplomb into the corner.

However, the hosts were fully deserving of all three points as the link up play throughout the team was of a very high standard and the visitors just could not cope. The only concern on  sunny after (other than the digital ticketing system not working causing chaos at the turnstiles) was the very disappointing defending of corners, with all three West Ham goals coming from corner kicks. That is certainly something to work on but let’s not take anything away from this performance.

The victory sees Palace climb above Chelsea and into 11^th place in the Premier League.  With Fulham still to play and only five points ahead in 10^th, perhaps we can hunt them down with a strong finish to the season?

BOB’S POINT OF VIEW

Bob White was a coach at Palace under the tenure of Steve Coppell and Alan Smith and will be sharing his point of view each week in our review article.

“The early omens didn’t look good with the pre-match fiasco at the turnstiles meaning a 15 minute delay to kick off and then going a goal down inside 10 minutes.

So let’s get the negatives out of the way first. Our defending at corners, particularly in the first defensive man position was very poor allowing the Hammers to score all of their three goals. That apart they threatened our defensive unit on very few occasions in open play. However, that may sound churlish whilst we witnessed an entertaining seven goal thriller with our team producing one of the best attacking displays seen at Selhurst for quite some time.

Our passing was progressive, pressing the opposition in all areas of the pitch and frequently creating a number of goal-scoring opportunities. It was reflected in the overall statistics. Fifteen attempts on goal combined with 60% possession confirmed that we richly deserved all three points.

There were a number of excellent individual performances – Eberechi Eze, Jeffrey Schlupp and Jordan Ayew among them. However, my man of the match award goes to Cheick Doucoure – an imperious performance in the engine room. It says something when their key player Declan Rice was anonymous for the whole game.

So we finally achieve that key 10 wins in a season mark and the 40 point total managers of teams in the lower regions of the league like to reach as soon as possible to guarantee Premier League status. All credit to Roy Hodgson, his staff and players. A total of 13 points gained from our last 6 games combined with some very decent performances has certainly improved the mood of everyone including fans connected to our club.

Let’s now see if we can finish the season on a high. Up the Palace!”

POST GAME QUOTES

ROY HODGSON

 “It was a wonderful first half from our point of view, we played really well, did all the things we hoped we could do and our quality players produced.

Quality to West Ham to keep coming down from two goals behind, they’ve had a hectic schedule and it was incredible what they were able to do from set pieces, keeping the game alive”

Sometimes there are one or two too many flicks, but they were good today, the goals we scored today were good goals. We kept sustaining attackers and then winning the ball back so well when they cleared it.

If you’re going to become a good attacking team you can do you work and get the patterns of play how you want but without the quality of the players nobody notices it. The way we’ve worked here is exactly the same as we did four years ago, but now the club is set up with a more potent set up than before.” 

DAVID MOYES

“We didn’t start the game particularly well, could have been the quick turnaround and having a day less than Palace to prepare. We scored and gave ourselves something to build on. We scored good goals from set pieces but overall we got what we deserved but I do expect our teams to defend better than that and over the years we have done. Today I was really disappointed with how we defended. Their front players played really well and were a handful all game. We didn’t win the second balls very often and we allowed Palace to get control in the game.”

MATCH STATISTICS

POSITION IN THE TABLE (at the final whistle)

UPCOMING FIXTURES

06/06/23 Tottenham Hotspur (a) – Premier League (3pm)

13/05/23 Bournemouth (h) – Premier League (3pm)

20/05/23 Fulham (a) – Premier League (3pm)

28/05/23 Nottingham Forest (h) – Premier League (4.30pm)