January 2 2007

Stuart Green

The unbeaten run was stretched to four matches as Crystal Palace beat Norwich at Selhurst Park, writes Simon Pophale.

It was our third match in seven days, so Peter Taylor rotated the team again to avoid tiredness.

In came Stuart Green, with Shefki Kuqi, Dougie Freedman, Marco Reich and Leon Cort restored to the line up from the bench. Out went Mark Kennedy, Jamie Scowcroft, Danny Butterfield, Ben Watson and Jobi McAnuff.

Although from the first 20 minutes of this game, it looked that the changes were going to be for nothing as Norwich ran riot.

Darren Huckerby was giving Mark Hudson a torrid time, getting in a steady stream of crosses and was unlucky to hit the bar on 10 minutes as he turned Hudson in the box and his shot beat Flinders but hit the bar.

The other thorn in our side was Robert Earnshaw and from the first minute, he caused problems. Cort and Flinders played dilly-dally over a Huckerby through ball and Earnshaw nipped in front of Flinders, but put the ball into the side netting with the goal gaping.

After 25 minutes of non-stop pressure, we managed to break away and snatch a corner. Stuart Green crossed a dangerous ball to the far post which Cort headed across the goal and Hudson finished from close range.

A minute later, Green crossed again for Kuqi, his header being caught by Paul Gallacher.

Although Gallacher had no chance with the next effort from Kuqi a minute later. Kuqi dispossessed Safri on the halfway line, stormed towards the goal before playing a one-two with Freedman and giving Gallagher no chance with a close range effort.

It nearly became 3-0, after Kuqi set up Marco Reich whose 20 yard piledriver went wide of the right hand upright.

Norwich were literally handed a lifeline as they tried to claw back the deficit. Kuqi fouled Huckerby just outside the area and despite the Norwich player shoving Shefki, he escaped with a booking.

The red mist descended around Kuqi as he argued with Stuart Green, who was trying to calm him down. The resultant free kick was handled in the box by Fletcher. Earnshaw hit the penalty in off the bar with just injury time left in the first half.

Kuqi was not finished for the afternoon as he chased down a long ball and, cutting the ball back in the box to Green, he unleashed an unstoppable shot into the top right hand corner to restore the 2 goal lead.

The 2nd half began with McAnuff coming on for Reich at the restart and Norwich brought on Dion Dublin as Peter Grant attempted to try to save the match. Within 3 minutes, Dublin had crossed for Earnshaw who narrowly failed to connect.

McAnuff crossed for Leon Cort who headed just over from a diving effort on 59 minutes as we looked to increase our advantage.

Kuqi, whose eventful afternoon continued as his pass left Micheal Hughes in acres of room with only the keeper to beat, but Gary Doherty got back with a saving tackle.

Norwich did not seem to pose the same threat as they did in the first half and as time ticked by, they lost more and more belief.

Kuqi nearly got a deserved 2nd goal that his all action performance deserved, but he sent a header inches wide from a McAnuff cross at the death. A deserved 3 points, which saw 2007 start with a win.