Making sense of the performance at Palace

By Hugh Southon

Nobody likes excuses but sometimes they are justified and pleading “tired legs” on yesterday’s Palace performance seems reasonable to me.

We should perhaps do well to remember too that we have now taken four points from the six available against a team which has beaten Manchester City and Wolves away whilst drawing at Old Trafford.

Manuel Pellegrini was – on this occasion – more or less forced to play the same team as had run their legs of against Liverpool on Monday night with the exception of Arnie.

He  has been in a situation for some time where he has been juggling the same 15 and perhaps the injury to Samir Nasri has proved more critical than many would have imagined.

In reality it has meant that we have no seriously creative force in midfield and it’s probably worth remembering the manager’s  team planning was badly hit in the first place by the Lanzini injury.

That is all about to change with both players looking ready to return against Fulham next Friday night although  Manu will need more than a bit of time to get back to his best.

Given the injuries, it’s pretty impressive in my opinion that  we are in 10th place and still with a chance of reaching the top seven when in previous seasons such an injury plight would have seen us dicing with relegation.

So yes, disappointed by yesterday’s second half in a big way but Palace are no mugs and there were reasons for it.