There is no true double standard here. I am not belittling Sams abilities, or questioning the value of the service he supplied Palace with. You are.belittling Hodgson, not just on his pronunciation , but is football knowledge, management abilities, and questioning his attitude to money.
But let’s stick to the football questions.
You say he could have walked. Yes he could . He didn’t demand a new contract, it was offered.
That would indicate he accepted the fact this would be his last job. But it also indicates he was either conned, or would have to make do. That in turn indicates so would anyone else who took the job. And the lack of and type of player recruited indicates it was club policy to make do in most respects. The most probable reason for , Pulis, Sam, saying no thanks.
The squad gets older year in year out, and has had hardly any thing to significantly change that happening in recruitment. It’s not better than four years ago , the majority of that squad is over the hill.. And Hodgson, has only limited input into what comes in. Dougie, is employed to recruit , why else would he be allowed such a high profile as he enjoys, under Parish,s financial guidance. . Hodgson, can only accept the limitations set in that or leave the club in their own mess. Hodgsons problem is letting himself become the fall guy.
Hodgson has kept this lot in the division, there can be little doubt about that. And it’s glaringly obvious that ,that is all he has been charged to do. So yes Pulis, did a great job with a squad , that wouldn’t have gone further , and he knew it. And Sam, got some money spent, but wasn’t going to get any more. It’s not comparable Hodgson has done similar for four years with little more than sticking plasters over the fact that the squad was short on numbers, not actually an improvement on the standard throughout the group.
New management is around the corner, but if the contract, and reality is comparable to Hodgsons. Don’t get to excited when it happens.

My two penneth:

Performances aside, age alone means Roy will go either this summer, or at the very latest, next.

Then what? More anti-football? Or do we change direction? Can it even be done?

Asking if Southampton actually get better end results than us is a fair question, as is the response that, if the results are similar anyway, isn't it better to at least enjoy watching your team play?

I would be the first to say 'Yes', even with a 0-9 chucked in every season. In fact, don’t forget that Saints recently managed four top ten finishes, making Europe once. They play better stuff, and get better results than us for what seems a similar budget. I'd swap in a heartbeat.

But we cannot, and should not, aim to play like Southampton for two reasons, both I think get overlooked, particularly when calling for Roy to go:

1. Middling sized clubs can't survive playing decent football. Sadly, Southampton are the exception that proves the rule.

There are just so many clubs our size who played better football than us on their way out of the league, and so, so few to play better stuff and stay up. In fact, there is only one: Southampton.

Norwich, Bournemouth, Wigan, Fulham, Hull, QPR, Swansea, and post-Pulis Stoke etc all went down trying to play, whilst us, Burnley, Brighton (pre-Potter) and Newcastle all stayed up.

Forget about how long we've been in the league now. What matters is how our budget compares to the rest, and that hasn't changed. If you were a hedge fund manager, or a bookie, you'd give a middling sized club a better chance of staying up, by far, if they played anti-football. Sad, but mathematically evident.

2. We can't play a pressing game like Southampton, or a possession game like Brighton without the kind of major overhaul that just isn't possible.

We came up and stayed up playing counter-attacking football. Each new signing has been to replace a part of that particular machine. Team style is dictated by your players, especially your best ones. Just as Villas-Boas failed spectacularly when trying to get Chelsea to play a high line that didn’t suit key players like John Terry and Petr Cech, I see no evidence whatsoever that Zaha or Eze are suited to a pressing game, or to keeping possession for its own sake. Our DNA is the polar opposite.

Southampton came up and stayed up playing positive football. Adkins built them that way in the Championship, and as good as Pochettino, Koeman and Hasenhüttl may or may not be, each inherited a footballing side, with signings made to suit that style. The new man at Palace won’t have that.

We can’t play like Southampton, now, or at any time in the foreseeable future. We will have to get used to highly conservative football as played by Pulis, Allardyce and Hodgson for a good while yet.

Massive double standard, but I'd expect that from the hypocritical supporters of Roy and their contrived arguments packed with excuses for his failings.

It's not personal. The guy is 73 and won't get another job after this one. Coming to Palace was a great opportunity for him to vindicate the Iceland Roy tag a dire period with him at the helm of the England team that resulted in national embarrassments in 2014 and 2016.

Unfortunately, he didn't know when to quit. He could have left with his head held high at the end of 2018 or 19, now he's just hanging on like a delusional, tactically inept despot dictator refusing to admit that they have been beaten.

Complaints about him aren't based on the style of football, nor because we are in the top half. It's based on the 8 game winless run at the end of last season, 7-0 defeats, 3-0 losses to 10 men teams, 3-0 defeats at home to Burnley.

He's been here 4 years, he is responsible for the squad, the tactics, motivation (or lack of), and ensuring each player is performing at the peak of their ability. He fails on all categories.

We've got a much better squad than Pulis or Pardew ever had. Perhaps a bit weaker than the one Allardyce had, but he is performing worse than all of them.

This season we are very very lucky that Southampton and Manchester United only decided to play one friendly each.

Let's get someone in and give them the chance to have a strong finish to this season and build for next year.

This is not the only issue but certainly a large contributor to the problems I reckon. He should have been banging down the door at every opportunity to request replacements. The door was there to be walked out of if he didn’t like what he was hearing. Soldiering along is not what was required. Some consider this loyalty, I prefer to think he knew this is his last job so he has just stuck with it, whilst amassing a nice legacy for his family.

I’m pretty convinced he will be gutted though if his final job ends up with his own local club in tatters knowing he has been part of that demise.