Crystal Palace failed to pull off another shock result on Sunday as they were beaten 1-0 by Chelsea at home – hardly a scoreline to be too displeased with but what manager Roy Hodgson said after the loss shows that, while they’ve taken a fairly impressive points haul from December, Palace have learnt nothing from the past few games.
What did he say?
Speaking to the press after the defeat, Hodgson was asked as to whether Palace could have been more adventurous in the game, to which he replied:
“We could have been four or five down if we did that. We limited their chances and they have a lot of quality. It wasn’t one of our better days technically. We tried to keep them tight and under some control. We tried to take our chances.
“We weren’t at our best on the ball, they were very good on the ball.
It’s certainly pretty depressing to hear if you’re a Palace fan, but what can be taken from the former England boss’ words?
Fear of embarrassment
The 71-year-old quite clearly set up his team to frustrate the Blues, as he did against Manchester City, and it worked for the best part of the game but, once N’golo Kante put Maurizio Sarri’s men ahead, the plan should have changed there and then.
After picking up impressive wins over Leicester and the Cityzens, in particular, it’s a shame that Palace were too fearful to try and go after a result, instead opting to sit back and hope for a 0-0 draw – this fear of being embarrassed by a side better than his is compounded in the first sentence of Hodgson’s answer.
At 1-0, a game is not lost – as the Eagles showed when they came back from behind to beat the champions in their own back yard – however Hodgson seemed resigned to defeat after the visitors took the lead and, as opposed to changing shape and trying to get back on level terms, the men in red and blue continued to defend passively and thus allowed Chelsea to kill the tie.
It took until the last ten minutes for Palace to realise they needed to do something and this late flurry was not enough to stop the Stamford Bridge outfit from returning to west London with three points.
While he should have netted late on, Connor Wickham is the big, bustling centre-forward Palace have been crying out for all season – it’s remarkable that he was introduced with such little time to make an impact and the same goes for Max Meyer, who is one of the few players capable of picking out a lethal pass.
It’s clear from his press conference that Hodgson has learned nothing from the big wins earlier in the month and still underestimates the quality that his team possesses – he must wake up and smell the coffee otherwise it could be a long second half of the season for the Eagles if they continue to show so much respect to teams and approach games with such negativity.
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