Crystal Palace defender James Tomkins has admitted that it was a surreal experience witnessing the opening ceremony at Tottenham's new stadium last night (Wednesday).
The Eagles were the visitors for the first Premier League fixture at the new Tottenham stadium, with goals from Heung-min Son and Christian Eriksen earning Spurs a 2-0 win.
But Tomkins, who impressed at the heart of the Palace defence on the night, said it was "not ideal" having the opening ceremony for the new stadium prior to kick off.
"It’s always tough playing Spurs. And coming to the new stadium as well, it was always going to be a bit tougher I suppose. But we gave it a good go, in the first half we kept them pretty quiet and in the main I think we did pretty well. We all know we can do better but it was their day today.
"At the start it’s not ideal with the ceremony, that goes on and you’re standing there for quite a while. It’s quite surreal compared to what you’re used to but the atmosphere was always going to be great and we kept them quiet, that was the main thing: coming here and keeping that crowd quiet for as long as we could. We did that but couldn’t quite get the win.
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"Everyone’s full of emotion, not just the players. We’ll take positives out of that going into a big game on Saturday."
Palace were, however, boosted by results elsewhere, with Brighton and Cardiff City both losing as well, against Chelsea and Manchester City respectively.
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And Tomkins said that while Palace must focus on themselves, he conceded that they had to be realistic about the impact of other results.
"Sometimes it’s not nice looking at other results and hoping for losses here and there but that’s the reality of it. Hopefully we can get some points on the board from now until the end of the season."
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