Crystal Palace Fan View: Three things we learned

Defence a shambles without Sakho

I said the biggest loss against Tottenham was Mamadou Sakho and that certainly proved to be the case when Burnley came to town. In isolation losing Sakho would have been far from ideal but in the context of Crystal Palace’s defensive woes it proved to be a step too far.

The injuries to Scott Dann and James Tomkins meant that it was Damien Delaney stepping out into the sunshine on Saturday afternoon, paired with Martin Kelly. I say this with a heavy heart, but if today’s performance is anything to go by then Damien Delaney is finished. At the age of 35 it’s taken as given that he won’t be the quickest player on the pitch but yesterday he struggled with so much more than that.

Gone was the aerial dominance, gone were the last ditch challenges and gone was the fire that burned within him, the fire which made up for his technical shortcomings on numerous occasions. Gone, it seems, is Damien Delaney.

The whole defence struggled yesterday though and their struggles will reiterate to Sam Allardyce the work he has to do in the summer. If this club has genuine intent about progressing then signings in defence will be in order. The signature of Mamadou Sakho or someone of his calibre is an absolute must, he is a step up from anything we’ve seen at Crystal Palace… ever.

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Overreaction order of the day among Crystal Palace fans

Our performance against Burnley was very poor, I accept that. To a man, there were no ‘good’ performances – I’ve mentioned the defensive struggles but going forward we were not much better. Benteke was ineffective, Puncheon’s attacking contributions remain few and far between and even Townsend and Wilfried Zaha failed to have any meaningful impact although it wasn’t for lack of trying.

One poor performance doesn’t change our predicament though. Speak to some fans and they’ll tell you that we’re now nailed on for relegation and the same team that won six from the previous eight games at the start of the week now needs an overhaul all of a sudden. We had a bad day, us fans need look no further than that however disappointed we may be.

As for the claim that we’re still in danger of relegation, well, it’s rubbish. Mathematically is that the case? Of course. In reality? We’re no longer in danger of relegation. If you work on the assumption that we’re going to collect no points between now and the end of the season then Swansea must beat either Manchester United or Everton and beat both Sunderland and West Brom between now and the end of the season.

In the 9 games Swansea have played since Valentines day they’ve collected 7 points which, even if achieved in the final 4 games, wouldn’t be enough to trouble Crystal Palace unless they score 30 goals in the process. Remember, this is working on the assumption that we don’t take a single point in our last three games as well.

I’m not being arrogant, I’m being realistic. Turn up against Hull and we’re unequivocally safe, that’s the truth of it but even if we pick up nothing I’d be surprised if we went down.

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Fatigue a factor

There was lots of discussion in the lead up to the game about scheduling and the Burnley game being the third game Crystal Palace would have played in a week. It’s far from ideal, but I don’t think scheduling is necessarily the root of the problem here because there were a number of factors which culminated in Saturday’s performance.

The fixture list was one of them. Three games in a week at the end of the season is always going to be a struggle, particularly for a team who in Sam’s words “were not fit enough” a few short weeks ago. However it’s that man, Sam Allardyce, that is partly culpable also. Little or no rotation against Tottenham and subsequently against Burnley means it is largely the same set of players that have played 270 minutes of football in the last week. We don’t have great strength on the bench and injuries have forced his hand to a degree but even so, retrospectively, changes could have been made.

Our approach doesn’t help either. Tottenham and Liverpool in particular were both huge physical efforts and huge mental efforts as well. To hold concentration for a full 90 minutes against two of the best teams in the league is a tough ask and of course these games came off the back of games against Chelsea & Arsenal. Chasing shadows and matching the big boys is tiring and that finally came round to bite us yesterday.