Quite a week. The natives have been restless, calling for Dougie's sacking and asking where the new signings are. Others have been keeping the faith and backing the club. This game was always going difficult in an atmosphere to match.
So the players responded. A cross into the centre from Murray was cleared leaving the Palace striker on the floor. But Bolasie picked it up wide out on the left showed some trickety to get to the touchline and a low cross along the ground to the feet of Murray put Palace a goal up in no time at all. Just what we all needed. The half saw some great performances particularly from new boys Moritz and Delaney and the whistle went with Palace still leading. Almost as suspected, Wednesday equalised five minutes into the second half when Antonio scored from a set peice that wasn't properly cleared.
Then something happened that can only happen to Palace. A great tackle in the area on Murray who went down as a result but the referee gave the penalty. The Selhurst crowd went mental but so did the Wednesday players who man handled the referee until he consulted the linesman. After what seemed to be confrontation everywhere, the referee changed his mind and tried to arrange a drop ball, only to change his mind again and gave the ball to Kirkland the Wednesday keeper. All very bizarre but that only seemed to wake up the Palace faithful and give the players something more to fight for. And it happened. Some trickery from Wilf out wide, selling enough dummies to the full back to fill the Wednesday coach back to Sheffield, a cross finally came and Murray stretched to poke it past the keeper at the near post and into the back of the next. Selhurst erupted. This wasn't just a win. It meant more than just the three points. And against a team that had been on an unbeaten run. Everything worked, Dougie didn't make the usual defensive substitutions (Moxey apart) using debutant striker Goodwillie and later Joniesta. Every Palace player played their part. The season begins here.
View from TheEaglesBeak; A difficult week ends in Selhurst Park buzzing. New signings shine but we only had to look closer to home for that striker we have been missing. Maybe it wasn't a new striker that was needed. Maybe just players to give the front men a supply line. Maybe, just maybe Dougie knew what he was doing all along to get a result that was needed ahead of the two week break and to give us fans something to chew on.
01 Speroni
27 Delaney - booked
28 Ramage
04 Parr
07 Bolasie (Williams 81')
10 Garvan
14 Blake (Moxey 46')
15 Jedinak
30 Moritz (Goodwillie 63')
16 Zaha
17 Murray GOALS 1', 83' - booked
Unused substitutes; 34 Price, 02 Ward, 08 Dikgacoi, 18 Wilbraham
Referee; Lewis
Attendence; 14,043
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