A friend of mine who is a Liverpool fan asked me how popular Roy is at Palace as he was really unpopular there. I dont think Roy has ever had much rapport with the fans. Especially not England.
I am now certain Roy will see the season and his contract out with us. I am also certain he will be leaving then.
Last night, I couldn't help thinking that our style of play which was clearly not Royball style was due to fan pressure to which the club sensibly responded. Someone somewhere in the club midst must push on with that. We held a very good Chelsea to a 1-1 draw for 90 minutes.
With our FIVE best players missing, Olise, Eze, Doucoure Guehi and Johnstone, WE DID ASTONISHINGLY WELL.
I applaud the players for the performance and believe between them all, so long as Roy dont stick his defensive oar back in, we will be fine. We HAVE TO believe in ourselves and our naivety and keep fighting like we did last night. It was even fun to watch. We CAN go out and attack and create chances and score.
We have to BELIEVE IN OURSELVES and keep attacking.
One of our best players just needs to get up off the bench, Johnstone. Two more should be back within one month/six weeks. But even with just Johnstone back on the pitch it will make a major improvement to what is already a big step forwards.
So whoever was behind last night's performance within the club, believe it ,keep it going, build on it and dont let Roy play Royball ever again.

Think his name is Adam Wharton.

Which bit are you referring to?

So had time to digest last night.

My thoughts are it was a huge improvement to what we have seen recently. A point would have been a fair result. I am actually really bored of the stats. Sky and BT have made them into a thing to fill hours and hours of air time talking bollocks about nothing. Yes Chelsea had more of the ballin the first half but did nothing with it. We had more shots. So who was better? The only stat that matters really is who won. That’s it and unfortunately it was them. They upped there game 2nd half, we were very naive (again) instead of staying focused for the start of the 2nd half. We also got tired and don’t have the depth of squad. They brought on Sterling. We brought on Ahamada. One of there central midfielders cost more than our entire team… and they had 2 at that price out there and we held our own for the first half.

All many of us wanted was for a decent performance with a bit of fight shown. I can live with Franca making a f*** up if it means he is learning the ropes and he showed some really good strength and touches which show he may well be an unpolished diamond given half a chance. Wharton looks like he is going to be class and Munoz looked good and an upgrade on the right.
I would suggest Mitchell could have done with a bit more help and perhaps Ayew in front of him and Franca on the right would be a better balance.

I thought Richard’s looked solid enough at the back and Anderson looked better too.

I can’t wait to see the new guys in the same team as MG, Eze and Olise and if we are lucky maybe all of them with Docure next season.

My only real gripe is the keeper issue. I am not saying Henderson was to blame last night but I do think Johnston may have done better and overall he is a better keeper.
There has not been a single post where anybody thinks it’s better to have Henderson in goal. Very very strange choice.

Ive read loads of posts saying Franca was naive, careless, etc. etc. Well I saw a young kid from Brazil who TWICE ran straight through the middle of the Chelsea midfield and defence and on the second occasion let rip a superb shot that our keeper would just have watched fly into the net. Their bloke got his hands to it at full stretch.
I saw him hassle and harrie their players, win the ball on loads of occasions, and never give up.
OK, he slipped up a couple of times with his passes and balance, but hey it was a greasy pitch and so did plenty of other players.
I saw Munoz (our new rb ) do loads of good stuff. I saw Wharton really settling in to the role we have all been wanting since Doucoure went down at Luton. Maybe even better.
There was loads for us to build on. Matates bit of magic where he ghosted the full back. Edouard's maize run.
Then the majestic 25 yard bullet from Jefferson that graced the match. (which our manager hardly reacted to).
Man we have got ability. It just needs believing in and working on.
Hughes was tireless, Andersen a constant angry warrior, Richards and the others all giving it bite. Put Johnstone out there and watch us finish a game with no goals against.

Gallagher is a very good box-to-box player, but I think his goal celebrations last night were somewhat oickish.

Isn’t there a protocol about not celebrating too vigorously when you score against your former club?

As for jumping into the fans! I don’t suppose the stewards were very happy about that.