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November 23 2024 8.01am

Leicester City 1 - 0 Palace

Sat Feb 1 2003 - League

Crystal Palace left the Walkers Stadium with a 1-0 defeat to promotion favourites Leciester City.

The smallest man on the pitch - Paul Dickov - got the only goal of the game in the 77th minute which flattered the home side.

Match Stats

Ground: Walkers Stadium (Attendance: 27005)

Leicester City: Walker, Sinclair, Elliott, Heath (Jones, 58), Rogers, Scowcroft, Izzet, Davidson, Stewart, Dickov, Benjamin (Tommy Wright, 58)

Subs not used: Summerbee, Flowers

Bookings: Izzet, Scowcroft

Goal: Dickov 77

Palace: Berthelin, Popovic, Symons, Powell, Butterfield (Akinbiyi, 78), Mullins, Derry, Granville (Gray, 67), Black, Johnson (Fleming, 66), Adebola

Subs not used: Cronin, Freedman

Booking: Granville

Referee: S W Mathieson (Stockport)

Palace started well and Andy Johnson was unlucky to see his volley go inches over the bar. Ian Walker was called into action, making a good catch from a Tommy Black effort.

Johnson was starting to look lively and had a curling shot go just past Walker's post after 33 minutes.

Eight minutes before half-time, James Scowcroft headed Muzzy Izzet's corner wide and from the goalkick, Palace should have gone into the break with a deserved lead.

Mullins ran through the Foxes defence and with only Walker to beat, forced a top save from the former England keeper.

There was still time for Cedric Berthelin, replacing the AWOL Alex Kolinko, to make an easy save from Izzet before the ref blew for half-time.

In the second half, Danny Butterfield had a long-range shot go just wide and on the hour mark, Matt Elliott's header was cleared off the line from an Izzet corner.

Scowcroft then had a header go straight into the arms of Berthelin from close-range when he should have scored before Dickov scored what proved to be the winning goal with a great strike into the top corner with 13 minutes left and the result certainly flattered the title-challengers.

Post match comments:

Trevor said: "I was pleased with the way we played particularly in the first half when we created good opportunities and might have been two goals up.


Our strikers had their chances but they were squandered, Paul Dickov's strike was a perfect execution and that is the difference between winning and losing
Trevor Francis

"Our strikers had their chances but they were squandered, Paul Dickov's strike was a perfect execution and that is the difference between winning and losing."

Francis explained why Alex Kolinko was missing from the squad: He was not feeling well on Friday but travelled with us.

"Although to be sure we included our young keeper Lance Cronin and as it turned it we needed him as sub keeper because Alex wasn't able to take his place."

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