Scoreless stalemate with Sunderland continues Palace’s unbeaten start to the season

Photo: ©️ Capital Football

Crystal Palace 0 v Sunderland 0

By Kaz Mochlinski at Selhurst Park

Premier League

Matchweek 4

Crystal Palace comfortably maintained their unbeaten start to the season, but a scoreless Saturday afternoon stalemate with Sunderland at Selhurst Park left them still seeking a first home win in the Premier League of this campaign.

Palace stretched their run without losing in the league to 10 matches, which is a really impressive achievement despite consisting of seven draws and only three victories. Again this time they struggled to add a cutting edge up front to a tight defence.

Having seen Eberechi Eze depart last month, following on from the sale of Michael Olise the previous summer, while holding on to Marc Guéhi and Dean Henderson, the disparity between the Eagles in attack and at the back is hardly surprising.

It was significantly exacerbated against Sunderland by Palace having to cope with the absence through injury of forwards Ismaïla Sarr and Eddie Nketiah, along with their increasingly influential midfielder Adam Wharton.

For all his own qualities as a footballer, Daichi Kamada could not remotely replace Eze’s goal threat from the left wing, nor was new signing Yéremy Pino able yet to replicate Sarr’s creative contributions on the right in Palace’s front three.

Pino looked promising on his first start for the Eagles and his home debut, but they greatly missed Sarr’s supply of nine goals plus assists in the last 12 games that he has started for Palace across all competitions.

Although they prevented Sunderland from having a single shot on goal in the whole match, Palace themselves failed to register any attempt on target in the first half, with Pino the main culprit as he twice got into good positions before squandering them.

When the earlier sunshine gave way to torrential rain after half-time, Palace were repeatedly denied by a man-of-the-match performance from Sunderland goalkeeper Robin Roefs, with the 22-year-old Dutchman making a string of excellent saves.

However, the Crystal Palace manager, Oliver Glasner, was also convinced that his side should have been given a late penalty when Christantus Uche, having come on as a substitute for his first Eagles appearance, was brought down inside the area.

Tyrick Mitchell’s precisely-played cross from the left was headed on by Chris Richards for Uche at the far post to meet on the volley. It was stopped by another Roefs block, but the Palace forward was caught late by Wilson Isidor covering back.

“I think we have to get a penalty in this situation” insisted Glasner, who was perplexed that the referee, Thomas Bramall, failed to see the contact, and the VAR, Tim Robinson, was unconvinced about the initial decision being a sufficiently clear and obvious error.

“Is it ok with the studs up and with his leg stretched that he touched him? Even if it’s just slightly, if you touch him with the leg stretched and the studs up and inside the box it’s a penalty. So the VAR ought to intervene in this situation, but it didn’t happen.”

Photo: ©️ Capital Football

The incident fitted with Glasner’s overall feeling about the game from Palace’s perspective: “Frustration.” Although he went on to expand: “I don’t like this word, it’s so negative. It’s a little bit more disappointment about the result.

“I think especially at the end we deserved to win the game. But we were unlucky that they had a great goalkeeper today, who had three-four incredible saves. We missed one or two chances. And then when you don’t score it’s very important not to lose.

“I think we were very consistent defensively again. We gave them one shot in the first half, but thanks to the great work of Ty Mitchell everything was controlled really well.

“But I guess scoring goals it was not our best - regarding efficiency - it was not our best performance. And then it’s a draw. But still unbeaten. So it feels a little bit could have been more, but it’s ok.”

And Glasner added: “We all feel the same. It was not starlight today, but it was absolutely ok. And a little bit it reminded of the beginning of last season, when we missed a few chances. But again yesterday’s session was the first with this squad...

“Ismaïla and Eberechi in the front three had 60% of our goals from last year. The new players have to find out the system, and they will find out the system. So it was really satisfying today’s performance.”

Glasner was especially enthusiastic about Pino and Kamada’s contributions. At the same time, while immensely appreciative of Eze’s exceptional involvement in Palace’s best-ever season, he sought to down-play the impact on the club of losing the winger.

“I think I can remember, especially at the beginning of the season, Ebs missed quite a few chances. I remember a 0-0 against I guess Man United. He had a massive chance in the second half and missed it, in a game where we needed to score.

“So it’s normal, players missing chances. We had games where we didn’t score with Ebs, and we will have games where we don’t score without Ebs. Looking forward to this season, let’s see how the new boys are working.

“Let’s see the things that we are talking about - again this week it was more on the video screen than on the pitch - that these things are working. When I see the first chance in the first half it’s made by a pass from Daichi Kamada to Yéremy Pino.

“That Pino is in this position, this is exactly what we want, finding this space. Daichi knows that the player always is free in these positions, so from him I expect this pass. But that Yéremy is already there shows that he is progressing quite well.

“And he’ll get more confidence in this now he is a little bit more thinking ‘Where I have to go, where I have to be, what should I do?’ And the more it gets automatic the better he will be and the easier it will be to score goals for him. And this is very sure.

“It was the same with Ismaïla Sarr, who missed a few chances at the beginning of last season to get into this rhythm, the Premier League rhythm to our game. So I’m very positive after this game.”

Photo: ©️ Capital Football

Regarding Kamada, Glasner expanded: “I wished he scores today. I know he wants to score. He had two great finishes from the edge of the box, and I experience that he scores from these positions. He scored in the second year at Frankfurt 15 goals.

“And more or less from these positions, because he has such an exceptional finish. But I just want to tell you that I’m always listening to people with much more experience in the Premier League. The chairman said to me once:

“‘You are talking about this as if, it looks like we are all, we’re getting more and more impatient with players. Years ago, we always said every player who comes into the Premier League needs at least one year to adapt. And now we expect them coming in and they adapt immediately.’

“So, everything he could see that happened with Daichi, he said it was maybe quicker than many others. So it took him maybe six months, seven months, eight months - you know, the physicaity, the quality of the players, the pace of the game is just different.

“That’s why the Premier League is the best league in the world. And then we also have to give time for the players to adapt. They’re all human beings. With great effort. Daichi always had that effort, now he has the confidence back again.

“Because he can see ‘Hey, I can deal with the Premier League.’ And this gave him confidence, whereas at the beginning he struggled, because he lost too many balls, he didn’t get the fouls.

“And then he was thinking ‘Oh, am I good enough for the Premier League?’ Then he proved it, he showed it, and now he has the confidence and that’s I think just something many players are facing who arrived first time to enter in the Premier League.”

Next in store is a visit from Millwall in the League Cup, with some squad rotatation necessitated by the growing number of Palace players being called up for the international match window earlier this month.

“Our big challenge was getting everybody back here again from international duties, and organising, planning this game” explained Glasner. “Jeff Lerma played both games for Colombia. Marc Guéhi played both for England.

“Chris Richards played many minutes for the USA. Now let’s see how they are. They played today again many minutes.” The one man who may be very likely to start against Millwall is centre-forward Jean-Philippe Mateta.

Despite his horrific head injury in the previous meeting between the clubs in the FA Cup in the spring, according to his manager, Mateta is one of those footballers who is still determined to spend as much time on the pitch as possible.

“I think he will play. He always wants to play every single game. He always wants to score goals. And I think he had just eight minutes in the last Millwall game. He wants to have more than eight.

So, if he doesn’t come to me and say ‘Gaffer, I prefer sitting on the bench’, but I can’t imagine this - he’s a striker - then I think I’ll play him.”

Crystal Palace: (3-4-3) Henderson - Richards, Lacroix, Guéhi - Muñoz, Hughes, Lerma (Devenny 68), Mitchell - Pino (Uche 84), Mateta, Kamada

Sunderland: (4-2-3-1) Roefs - Hume, Mukiele, Alderete, Mandava - Xhaka, Sadiki (Geertruida 84) - Talbi, Diarra, Adingra (Brobbey 69) - Isidor (Rigg 94)

Attendance: 25,154