February 11 2005

Kit Symons

KIT SYMONS admitted this week that signing trial players Nicolas Pavlovich and Sergei Dadu was not worth the gamble despite them both scoring against Chelsea in a specially arranged match, by Stuart Pink.

The duo were two of a number of players on trial at Palace during the January transfer window, but despite impressing against an experimental Chelsea side, the Palace staff decided not to pursue their interest.

SYMONS said: "We won 3-2 and Pavlovich and Dadu both scored. Pavlovich looked more than decent, he's got ability without doubt.

"But for the money that we would have had to stump up for him we weren't willing to pay that on a player we'd hardly seen.

"If it had been a situation where we could have got him on loan we might have done something."

On Dadu, SYMONS felt he "wasn't at a level for us to bring him in", as was the case with Dmitri Bulykin who eventually missed out on a move to Portsmouth because his registration was not completed on time.

Saturday's blank in front of goal has only highlighted Palace's need for a quality striker, and Iain Dowie will hope the club's failure to land a new frontman won't come back to haunt the Eagles in the bid to avoid the drop.

Dean Ashton and Bobby Zamora were other targets that were missed, but SYMONS believes the club would only loosen the purse strings if they thought the player would definitely make an impact.

SYMONS said: "Although we were desperate to get players in and really wanted to strengthen the squad, we wouldn't buy for the sake of buying.

"There's no point we've got good players here, so unless we're convinced someone is going to enhance the quality in the squad, I don't think there's any point in buying for the sake of it."

With the window now closed, focus will now be turned to securing the future of current players with a number of Eagles stars contracts or loan deals expiring at the end of the season.

But SYMONS admitted players such as Gary Borrowdale, Dougie Freedman, Gonzalo Sorondo and Nicola Ventola might have to wait until the end of the season to discuss new deals, as Palace's status in the Premiership will be a factor on what terms can be offered.

But talks are now ongoing for the extension of contracts for both Gabor Kiraly and Emmerson Boyce, as both players have clauses in their contracts to review terms after a significant number of appearances.

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