Outstanding Eagles Reach FA Cup Final With Convincing Win Over Villa

The nerves were all to clear among the Palace fans heading to Wembley but it was a day to savour as every player toa man put in a performance that will be talked about for a long time.

MATCH INFORMATION

PLAYER RATINGS

UNUSED SUBSTITUTES – 2 Joel WARD, 17 Nathaniel CLYNE, 21 Romain ESSE, 30 Matt TURNER, 55 Justin DEVENNY

OPPOSITION LINE-UP

UNUSED SUBSTITUTES – 5 Tyrone MINGS, 16 Andres GARCIA, 24 Amadou ONANA, 25 Robin OSLEN

TEB VERDICT

What can you say about that performance that will do it any justice? A performance that has put the club on the brink of glory.

This is a very special group, and not on the pitch, the management team and everyone in the background doing all the preparations to make this happen.

The players did their job better than we all expected, but the brave call by Oliver Glasner to start to much criticised Daichi Kamada over Will Hughes and Jefferson Lerma was inspired. The Japanese international revelled in the faith that his manage showed in him.

Respect must be paid to every single player who made this possible, who went out on to that Wembley pitch and executed the tactics and took the chances brilliantly. The penalty miss would have affected any player in such a big game, but not Jean-Philippe Mateta. He had a moment after the miss and got on with it and never looked back.

The deserved man of match was Ismaila Sarr who put in a performance that was better than that at Brighton with a brace and an assist.

One final mention to the fans, and to the Holmesdale Fanatics who did what they always do with an amazing display which set the tone right from the start, and the Palace fans needed no further encouragement. A credit to the club.

What a day, and one that you have to ask if it can be beaten. There is only one way to find out…

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.

“A performance of the highest quality from the team. Factoring in the whole context of the game. it is one of the best performances I have witnessed in all my years either as a supporter or when working at our club. Our supporters know how to create a vibrant and loud atmosphere at Wembley. A magnificent effort on and off the pitch.”

POST GAME QUOTES

OLIVER GLASNER

“All credit to the players. They had to work so hard and they had to overcome a few difficult moments. We got more control and it was an unbelievable performance. The players stuck to the plan and we never lost our heads. The most important thing is everyone stayed calm. The team are such great guys, they always believed in us and we have always had a great togetherness.”

STEVE PARISH

“I thought they were excellent. All credit to the manager and the players, you can see what it means to them. I thought today was a real celebration for the fans. Two clubs who haven’t won a lot of honours in recent times, for us never. A great occasion at Wembley and we stand at the edge of doing something we’ve never done before.

I got the tube here with the fans, it was a fantastic experience. It takes two hours to get here in the car!”

DEAN HENDERSON

“Absolutely delighted – over the moon. We haven’t been on the greatest run of form, but the lads came out and put on a show. We were waiting for those moments, we sat in the block and, with the pace we have got, we hit them on the break.

If we can perform like we did today in the final, then anything is possible. The lads were outstanding. If we play like we did today, we can beat anyone.”

EBERE EZE

“A special day. I’m grateful to God for the opportunity to play here, to win, to go to the final. We want to go all the way and we believe we can do it. We show performances like this all the time. We are not worried or fearful of facing anyone.

I saw the opportunity to shoot. I’m always trying my luck, always taking shots. We work on this stuff all the time. I’m grateful to God that I have scored today and helped the team.”

UNAI EMERY

“When they scored the first goal, it was more difficult for us and we only reacted after 2-0. Then we created more chances to score and we didn’t score. In transition, they are very good and they deserved to win. We had our moments but we must accept defeat. We were motivated for the semi-final and we lost, but we keep going.

MATCH STATISTICS

UPCOMING FIXTURES