The past couple of matches have taken me back. Back to the days of Neil Warnock giving debuts to players such as Victor Moses, John Bostock and Lee Hills. Back to Roy Hodgson’s first stint as Palace manager where Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Tyrick Mitchell came through.
It has also taken me back to the last time we had a similar injury crisis after Roy took over in 2017. At one point in the Spring of 2018 we had at least as many players out as now (remember Andros and Wilf as our two strikers?) and we still only narrowly missed out on a top ten finish.
On the face of it I should be furious. This is our 11th season in the Premier League, the world’s richest league, and after all that time and all that television money we should be well stocked in every position with a mixture of world class youth and experience to weather any injury crisis. In fact we should have so many quality players that regular squad rotation means all of our players are so well rested that injuries are far and few between.
Unfortunately that is not real life for any club outside the top six or seven. For the clubs not blessed with big stadiums, wealthy owners willing to pour money into the club and regular European football there seems to be two options. Spend big for a period of time and then hit the buffers (see Leicester, Wolves, Everton – jury is out on Villa and Brig***n ) or spend as little as possible and accept that relegation may come sooner rather than later. Hello Norwich, Huddersfield etc, etc. Palace have been trying to steer a middle course between those two rocks. So far we have been successful but that does not mean we don’t end up sailing too close to the wind from time to time.
One of the downsides to our approach is generally we seem to prefer to not sign a player as opposed to overspending on a player which we are not 100% confident in. The risk with this “low risk” approach is that we end up with a thin squad which is vulnerable to the impact of injuries. The benefit is we run a tight ship financially. With a chairman like Steve Parish who bears the scars of living through two insolvencies of the club he has supported since he was a boy, that financial caution is understandable.
Luckily we have a manager, players and a set of supporters who generally relish a scrap and like nothing more than a backs to the wall battle to eke out a win or draw in difficult circumstances. Of course no one wants to be in that position and everyone is desperate to get all our players back and playing well but if digging in is required that is exactly what everyone associated with Crystal Palace Football Club will do.
The key to this is Roy Hodgson ( and Ray Lewington of course). Roy has publicly said in interviews that he is happy to work with whatever players he gets (within reason of course) and he will find a way to get the best out of those players. He has done this every season at Palace with the only variable being the better the squad he is given the better the football on show. No one should underestimate, however, the importance of the players being willing to fight adversity in these situations and the supporters to recognise and appreciate the effort and desire our players show in these difficult circumstances.
The Manchester United and Forest matches before the international break were the perfect example of this collective attitude. Fair enough we were not playing free flowing attacking football but four points from those two matches is a good return. The willingness and hard work shown by players such as Jairo Riedewald and Jesurun Rak-Saki shows the desire to contribute from every member of the squad and the support from the supporters helped carry the whole team through. Palace have traditionally been a club that has had to fight for everything it gets and even after 11 years in the Premier League it’s good to know that this fighting spirit and togetherness is still there, on the training ground, on the pitch and in the stands.
Although I do love the plucky underdog role which has been Palace supporters bread and butter for many years, I cannot wait for the day when we have our attackers back and we can to start to make life more difficult for our opponents. I still believe we have the squad and manager to achieve a top ten finish this season the sooner we can get a fully (or near enough) fit squad the better. We have the core of a really high quality squad and with the constant rumours of more wealthy clubs being interested in players such as Andersen, Guehi, Eze and of course Olise this may be our best chance of a strong top ten finish for a number of years.
In the meantime we all need to stay in plucky Palace mode to keep eking out the points!
