Derby County v Palace

Pride Park, Friday 7.45pm

Wilfried Zaha

Team news

Crystal Palace winger Wilfried Zaha will be assessed after he picked up an ankle injury in training this week. Otherwise, Paddy McCarthy, Joel Ward (both groin) and Danny Gabbidon (hamstring) are all still out, along with midfielders Owen Garvan (knee), Andre Moritz (ankle) and striker Alex Nimely (hamstring).

Derby defender Gareth Roberts returns after serving a three-match suspension, along with Jake Buxton who has recovered from a knee problem.

Michael Hoganson (hip and foot), full-back Kieron Freeman (ankle), defender James O'Connor (knee) and midfielder Will Hughes (groin) are all is missing. Midfielder Ben Davies is a doubt (groin) but on-loan Norwich striker and former Palace loanee Chris Martin is set to make his home debut.

Quotes

Roy Hodgson

"I couldn’t say when, but I just know it’s not if, but a matter of when we reach the Premier League. The attitude we have at this football club is very refreshing. It’s very exciting to me to have the energy of this football club, and everything about it I believe is moving towards becoming a Premier League set up. That’s all you can ask.

"What excites me more than anything is the desire and the hunger and the belief of this club of where we’re trying to go. I think that is absolutely vital and it suits me to be at a club like this.

"Cardiff haven’t done this yet. They’ve nowhere near done it yet. They have to keep their form, which says they might do it.

"If anyone is counting their chickens, they haven’t hatched out yet. You can look at the eggs, but you don’t know how many chickens you’re going to get, so we’ll just sit in there and have a go.

"March is vital, but what is more vital is your attitude towards it, your club’s attitude towards it, and the belief that you are going to show while you go through it.

"All you can do is try and get the wins as quickly as you can, and the more you do that, the easier you make it in the end. Stats will tell you that you need to get at least four points out of a batch of six points out of the remaining 12 games, because that’s promotion winning form."

Chris Martin

"I scored in both games against Derby for Palace last season, so I'll be hoping to return the favour! I'm looking forward to playing at Pride Park. It's a great stadium and I've played there a few times before. I've managed to get on the scoresheet a couple of times there, too, so I'm hoping that run continues.

"I scored there for Palace last season (the Rams won 3-2) and I scored a header for Norwich in a 2-1 win, so I'm two in two – and if I can keep that ratio up, I'll be very happy!

"Palace have been going very well this season. They are a team I know well and they've got a lot of talented players. Glenn Murray is on fire up top, so they've got some people that we've obviously got to keep quiet.

"I played with Zaha, Jonny Williams and Glenn Murray. They've added (Yannick) Bolassie, who looks very good and sharp this season. I think everyone knew when I was there that Zaha was being linked with a lot of big clubs.

"He is some talent and good luck to him. He's got his move to Manchester United and I'm sure he'll go on and do well for them. So they've got some very good players, like most Championship teams nowadays.

"As I say, we've got to try to keep their good players quiet, which will be difficult, but we've got to focus on our own game and on putting in a good performance. If we put in a similar performance to the one at Watford, there's no reason why we can't get a positive result against Palace."

Derby County - league stats

Position	Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	Points
12th	34	11	11	12	44

Full league table

Derby County - current form

Played	Won	Drawn	Lost	For	Against
8	1	4	3	10	10

Full form table

Last five results

Date	Type	Home Team	Score	Away Team
17/11/2012	League	Crystal Palace	3 - 0	Derby County
24/03/2012	League	Derby County	3 - 2	Crystal Palace
07/01/2012	FA Cup	Derby County	1 - 0	Crystal Palace
02/12/2011	League	Crystal Palace	1 - 1	Derby County
19/03/2011	League	Crystal Palace	2 - 2	Derby County

All time results

Last meeting

Palace 3-0 Derby County

Saturday November 17 2012

Palace: Speroni, Ramage, Ward, Delaney, Moritz (Garvan, 76), Dikgacoi, Bolasie (Wilbraham, 89), Jedinak, Parr, Murray (Easter, 89), Zaha

Subs not used: Price, Moxey, Blake, O'Keefe

Goals: Murray (12, 82), Moritz (58)

Bookings: Jedinak

Derby County: Legzdins, Buxton, Keogh, Roberts, Brayford, Hughes, Bryson, Coutts (Tyson, 80), Jacobs, Hendrick, Sammon (Robinson, 74)

Subs not used: Fielding, Gjokaj, Hoganson, O'Brien, O'Connor

Bookings: Brayford, Jacobs