February 24 2019

A Palace fan pays his respects at the memorial to the late Leicester owner, Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha

Palace have good form against Leicester City in recent times. Jamesey and Wilf King were pleased to see the trend continue with a 1-4 victory at the King Power Stadium.

It was an an inauspicious start for Palace, writes Jamesey.

Wearing their white away strip the Eagles allowed themselves to be bullied and harried by a lively Leicester team in the first half.

The only answer seemed to be a succession of fouls and possession was almost totally surrendered to the home team.

Palace’s new striker hope Michy Batshuayi started the match and didn’t take too long to justify Roy’s faith before the half-time whistle.

Completely against the run of play James McArthur drifted into space and aimed a hopeful shot at goal. Schmeichel was completely wrong-footed when the striker’s boot redirected the ball into the Foxes’ goal.

A Palace goal scored by a hungry striker… whatever next?

The Eagles were a goal to the good after their first serious attempt.

The second half was a very different matter as Palace started to play like supporters know they can although a Jonny Evans goal in the 60th minute evened up the score.

Surely the manner in which the Leicester keeper harried and shouted at the referee over some imagined grievance at the end of the first period deserved a red card?

It was, however, sheer joy to see him pick the ball from the back of the net twice after two superb Wilfried Zaha goals in the 70th and 90th minutes.

Also sandwiched between Wilf’s strikes was an 81st minute penalty put away by the ever-reliable Luka Milivojevic.

It’s a little too early to relax on the relegation threat yet but that excellent win, plus a creditable goal difference leaves CPFC a likely top-tier team next season plus a great FA Cup run which could still lead supporters to a walk along Wembley Way.

Leicester boss Claude Puel got his marching orders on Sunday following the game. He follows a distinguished group of managers including Gus Poyet (Brighton) and Frank O’Farrell (Man U) to be fired after losing to Crystal Palace.

Out Foxed

As a regular contributor you may wonder what reasons I had for wanting to go to the King Power Stadium, writes Wilf King.

There were three:

I wanted to see first hand the memorial to the Leicester owner, Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, tragically killed in the helicopter crash at the stadium;

I hadn’t been to Leicester for a few seasons;

Crystal Palace have a good recent record against Leicester and three points would be very helpful to ease any relegations fears.

I hadn’t realised until a few days ago that there would be a fourth reason - on 23rd February 2019 Roy Hodgson would be the oldest Premier League manager at 71 years and 198 days beating Bobby Robson’s previous record.

The memorial had been moved to the end of the car park where the helicopter crashed and I was disappointed that the flowers had died and all you could see was a photo of Vichai and some banners.

I understand from talking to Leicester stewards that there are plans for a permanent memorial (possibly a statue) but it has to be given careful thought. The stewards seemed to appreciate my friend Bill and I taking the trouble to find the spot.

So on to the match. Crystal Palace were poor in the first half and there were shouts from Eagles fans for Wilfried Zaha to “get involved”. Leicester had all the possession and then on 40 minutes out of the blue (sorry red and blue!) Vichy Batshuayi scored his first goal for Palace with an assist from James McArthur. 0 -1 at half time

After Leicester equalised in the second half Palace found a new purpose. Zaha is such an enigma; he was hardly in the game during the first half standing on the fringes and then scores two beautiful goals with another assist from McArthur and one by Jordan Ayew.

Before the match I thought we would get a penalty and this was dispatched confidently by Luka Milivojevic. It is very heartening when the Palace players celebrate goals with the away fans and the delight on Wilfried’s face was also beautiful. Luka looked pleased too!

I was thrilled to have been at the King Power for such a convincing win and to witness clinical finishing by our team.

When strikers score three of a team’s four goals it is customary to award Man of the Match to one of them but my award goes to McArthur whose influence on the game was immense.

As for Roy, not only is he a superb manager but he deserves all the plaudits he received on Match of the Day.

Email Jamesey with your comments to jevans3704@aol.com

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