Been thinking for a while it'd be a grave mistake to let him (McArthur) go in Jan. Really hope we keep him till the end of the season.

TEX
Go boil your head
Take the best 2 or 3 players out of any premier team and they won't be the same
Silva and debruyne out of city
Kane and two more from spurs
Any team will suffer.
But the replacements from them are better than ours but not better than them.
Even lower teams around us take two or three out.
Reality check needed
There are three teams for a want of better wording at least as BAD AS US.
Watch this space and let me know at the end of the season.
I reckon we will survive ' just'
COYP

Sorry TEZ NOT TEX

Edited by cryrst (12 Dec 2017 11.41pm)

For those that kept telling us that the fabulous Alan Pardew for all his awful results was never in the bottom three...

He Is Now!

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The Ferret
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Fantastic to give it everything at the end again but we can't keep doing it and coming out okay.

We have issues at either end of the pitch. Deeney puts that open goal chance away and we lose and stay pretty much bottom. We are poor at the back and there's always 2+ goals available for the opposition.

We cannot set up our striker or link up with the 2nd striker (Wilf). People who criticise the inside out wide midfielders are right to when there's no full back overlapping allowed. It becomes too easy for defenders to stop Townsend or Cheek doing anything and Wilf never goes out to the wing the play is happening on. Instead he stays left of centre and Benteke stays right of centre. It's all really easy to handle until maybe late on when we want it more or Cleverly isn't so.

When Wilf is finally effective is late on when he goes wide. Cheek is completely wasted out wide and would be far more effective supporting Benteke and linking up with Cabaye and wingers.

I like Roy but this is on a knife edge all the time whilst not getting the best out of 2 very dangerous players. It would be okay if we started the season with Roy being safe yet frustrated with things not happening on the pitch due to rigid, no risk team orders, but we didn't and my fear is if the lack of creativity and movement which there is a distinct lack of, we could be in a difficult spell again.

He probably has it fight with the trickle of points as Pulis and Allardyce do but it's a concern that if teams learn exactly how to keep out our rigid non supporting attacks then we might not nick those wins, seeing as our defence is so unreliable.

COYP

I would probably say that for long periods tonight our two loan players put in the best performances, until Wilf unleashed his magic at the end.

However, Loftus-Cheek is clearly more comfortable in the centre of the park and neither he nor Schlupp looked happy playing together in the first half. In fact, they were all over the shop at times.

I was shouting for Jimmy McC to come on from the hour mark on and would much prefer him to start games. I take what others say about him not lasting and, of course, neither does Cabaye. And yet, ironically they have played well together in the past, but if neither can make 90 minutes that leaves the manager with a quandry.

Bakary Sako at least got amongst their defenders when he came on and, of course, scored a goal albeit on a double rebound. I like his spirit. He, at least gives it a go.

So, what do we do solve a problem like Benteke? (It could be a song from 'The Sound of Music')

He is the obvious target man yet:

he's a bit of a cowardly lion (certainly no Drogba)

and;

other players don't seem able to read him.

Very rarely do you find a Palace player instinctively running onto a nod or a flick. Why?

It may be because of the lack of confidence in the side i.e. players are only committing 50% because if it goes 'pear shaped' they don't get caught badly out of position, or it may have something to do with his inability to anticipate the movement of players around him.

The problem is also that you can only play through the middle to him because he hasn't got the speed, stamina, determination or ability on the ground to work the channels (a la Wright and Bright). If he was better at this, he and Wilf might split defences much more often than they do.

So, what is our best team until the January window? This may be determined by who's fit but, as a big fan of Jimmy McC, I would be interested in knowing from others how we should line up to incorporate him from the start?

55 years on the Palace rollercoaster!

If I remember correctly neither West Ham nor their fans wanted Tomkins to go but he couldn't get game time due to the excellence of the pair ahead of him.

He and Sakho made an excellent pairing last season until the injury curse hit us