Agreed re Ward. I much prefer a player who has stretched himself as far as possible just to be a 6 out of 10 Premier league player, as opposed to one with more talent who has dropped his effort and commitment levels to achieve the same performance level.

Ward has given his all, and will do so again.

Edited by TheBigToePunt (11 Jul 2021 3.55pm)

You cant have it both ways. Its an old squad, why extend their contracts, they arent getting any younger. All they would do is block younger talent from coming into the squad.
They have all been handsomely paid for their service, whilst at Palace, time to move on.

Ward ; give him another year. We do need to upgrade in this position but haven't done so yet as Ferguson hasn't been available. I don't think we are anywhere close to finding out if Ferguson is the answer long term. So short term retain Joel but we do need competition at right back.

Townsend ; worth another 2 years as a squad player in my view. Looks like the club may think otherwise.

Cahill ; I thought he started to look like it was too much for him at EPL level although that may have something to do with the compressed season. I'd let him go.

Old, Ungifted and White

I reckon Townsend appearing to concentrate more on radio and tv work than football hasn’t gone unnoticed. He needs to convince Palace he is still fully invested in playing if he wants to stay.

I would keep Cahill for one year to help bring on Rich-Bagheulou and any new young CH we buy.

If we are to keep Clyne for one season then I would let Ward go and vice versa.

I think you will find that as those players are not top of any other clubs shopping lists.
Palace will and should be concentrating on trying to sign their alternative and presumably younger transfer targets first.
If any gaps appear in the squad at the end of the window their will still be the possibility of filling them Ward Cahill & Townsend later on.
If in the meantime any of those players by chance get an offer elsewhere Palace can always counter offer (if the need arises and PV wants to down that line).That is the mercenary world of football!

Cahill's deal was supposedly £65k pw, which is a lot for a player of his age who was only fit to play around half our games last season due to various injuries. I imagine we probably would be happy to give him a new deal, but I very much doubt at the same wage.

By contrast Ward was supposedly on a more modest £35k pw. Still a solid pro and when we sat deep he had the positional sense, but his lack of pace is a growing concern. I'd still give him a short-term deal as a back-up, but I think the club could get a player of a similar level fairly easily on loan. Would we honestly be worse without him?

Townsend is still under 30 and would probably take a similar deal to before (around 50k pw). Again, a very solid professional, gets his head down and works hard. Personally I think he is a better option than Ayew out wide. We could do with an upgrade, but of the three I think he would be the biggest loss. Constantly talking about the situation on air might not please Parish though, even if the club do seem to have been pretty poor with their communication (which is disappointing).

Edit: if true, Eze's current deal is 30k pw, which puts the above figures into perspective!

Edited by taylors lovechild (12 Jul 2021 9.49am)