Schlupp has been a good signing for us, but he is at a crossroads in his Palace career right now. If his contract expired tomorrow I'm not sure he'd get a new one.

Firstly, he needs better luck with injuries. At his age they take more of a toll and the club will be less inclined to wait for him than they would for a younger player with eight or ten years of service left in them.

Secondly, he needs to find a way to fit in to how we now play. Schlupp is a tremendous athlete with a powerful shot, and when playing on the right for Hodgson showed a gift for timing off-the-ball runs into the box. Vieira requires a totally different set of skills from his midfielders, who need to be able to use the ball efficiently in tight spaces. In that respect, Schlupp has been probably the least successful of the old guard in converting to the new style.

Apart from Ayew and Mitchell, Vieira likes players to play on their 'wrong' side and cut inside, but playing Schlupp on the right of the midfield three seems not only unsuited to his strengths, but almost a showcase for his weaknesses. He struggles to play sharp, one and two touch stuff in small areas, and whilst the winger in him wants to run at players, the centre of the pitch is far more congested and when he gets to carry the ball forward he just bundles into crowds time and again.

Schlupp isn't going to get in on the left wing ahead of Zaha, Edouard or Eze. He could be a good left back in our system (Mitchell surely can't play every single game), and is possibly worth keeping just for his flexibility, but to get the best out of him, Vieira would have to not only play Schlupp on the left side of the midfield three, but also allow him to be less involved in build up play and more focused on bursting into the box in the inside left channel. That's quite a shift in tactics and I'm not sure Schlupp is a good enough player to justify it.

Back to the bench for Schluppy once everyone is available I'm afraid.

IMO Schlupp is a valuable squad player. With both Wilf and Jordan at Afcon, he is likely to get more minutes over the next 6 weeks. I'd like to see him get a 2 year extension.

He's an imside left, has great pace and power to break the defensive line, wicked left foot, but can only play as an atracking left sided midfielder, that plays to his strengths, in other positions he tends to go missing; like Ayew and Kouyate, great squad players

Two sides to the coin on the Amazon Prime matches, Leeds away and the recent Norwich home game. Barely registered against Leeds. That said it was a poor performance all round. In my opinion Hughes should of started and Gallagher further forward. Leeds were fragile and we needed to go at them attacking wise. Norwich game he looked far better, much more involved and showed his use. With him not going to the AFCON, whereas Ayew and Wilf are, he will no doubt get some extra game time and deserves it based on the last performance.

“ [T]here are known knowns; there are things we know that we know.There are known unknowns; that is to say there are things that, we now know we don't know.But there are also unknown unknowns – there are things we do not know we don't know. ”
—United States Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld