Crystal Palace have had a surprisingly good start to the year when compared to the same time last season and consistency has never been so important for the London-based club.
This year, heading into the busy Christmas period, Palace find themselves sitting in 6th place level with Tottenham whereas last year they were really struggling to find any success and looked destined for a return to the Championship before Alan Pardew took over from Neil Warnock.
This has mainly come about because of the way Pardew has set the team up to use the speed, skill and strength of their wide players in Yannick Bolasie and Wilfried Zaha. It has been a successful tactic.
Bolasie has been one of the most improved players for the side this year and now finds himself as a key component of the team. He is the second top scorer for the Eagles with four goals, just one behind Yohan Cabaye and has an assist to go with it. Those stats may not be the most impressive, however the work he does down the wing often sets up many of his side’s chances even if not directly being chalked up as assists.
Palace have one of the better away records in the Premier League having picked up 13 points out of a possible 21 which is an impressive feat when compared to their home form of 13 points from a possible 27. One of the main reasons for this is that they allow teams to have possession and wait for an opportunity to counter with the speed. The perfect example of this was in their away win over Liverpool at Anfield. They allowed the Reds to have 64% of possession, patiently waiting for their chance to hit on the break. Trumping Jurgen Klopp’s men 2-1 on the night, the truth is that the scoreline could have been further exaggerated had the finishing from their strikers been of a higher standard.
They have however, changed the way they play to try and suit the situation they expect to face. Against Everton they swapped Zaha with Mile Jedinak to add some defensive steel. Given the success they have had against teams that had more attacking ability than Everton such as Manchester United and Chelsea it seemed a strange move to take away one component of a game plan that had worked so well previously. The change made little impact on the space that Everton were able to create with the likes of Ross Barkley, Gerard Deloufeu and Romalu Lukaku able to find space to get chances on goal and the reason that they did not lose that game came down largely to defensive components that were already in the side in Scott Dann, Damien Delaney and a couple of good saves from Wayne Hennessey.
Unfortunately because of this it means that Socceroos captain, Jedinak will remain a bench player once he is fit again after picking up an ankle injury at training last week. In truth, the change had very little impact in the way that Everton were able to attack and unless either James McArthur or Cabaye get injured or suspended, the former Central Coast midfielder looks set to continue his bit-part role under Pardew.
As for this weekend, the Eagles face an in-form Stoke City at the Britannia who backed up a home win against Manchester City with an away draw against West Ham last week in a game they will feel they did enough to win even without Swiss maestro, Xherdan Shaqiri. Palace would be smart to keep the same side from the win over Southampton because they really could have won that game by more if it was not for the Saints goalkeeper Paulo Gazzaniga.
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