Anyway, I’ll be off. The fun doesn’t stop, though: Ben Fisher is all over Everton v Tottenham like moss on a riverside boulder. Bye!
I disagree with my colleague on that Evans tackle. A red card would have been extremely harsh, in my opinion.
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Ed Aarons was our man at Selhurst Park. Here’s his match report:
They couldn’t do it again, could they? As Leicester supporters will tell you, stranger things have happened. Another victory for Brendan Rodgers’s clinical side means they have now amassed one more point at this stage than during the title-winning season in 2015‑16, with Caglar Soyuncu’s header and Jamie Vardy’s late strike ensuring they moved back above Chelsea into third spot.
Yet if they are to stand a chance of keeping pace with Liverpool and Manchester City when it really matters, Rodgers must know they will need more than their fair share of luck. That was certainly the case here as Jonny Evans was fortunate to escape with just a yellow card for scything down Cheikhou Kouyaté a few minutes before his defensive partner popped up with opening goal.
Much more here:
Jamie Vardy is not visibly excited:
It was a big result. We knew it was going to be tough. We’ve struggled here in the past so to get the three points and a clean sheet, we’re obviously over the moon. Do you know what it is, I’m just taking each game as it comes. I’m getting a lot of chances fed to me by my team-mates and at the minute I’m taking them. I’ll knuckle down this week during training, get a little big more practice in and look forward to the game next week.
Final score: Crystal Palace 0-2 Leicester
90+6 mins: It’s done! Suyuncu’s first goal for Leicester, and Vardy’s squillionth, take the Foxes third!
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90+2 mins: Leicester hit the post! Chilwell is picked out by Praet’s long, lovely free-kick, his first touch is fabulous, and with Guaita already on the ground he needs only to sidefoot into the net from an acute angle! He sidefoots into the far post.
90+1 mins: There will be at least six minutes of stoppage time. It starts with Maddison applauding the away fans on his way off, and Dennis Praet coming on.
GOAL! Crystal Palace 0-2 Leicester (Vardy, 88 mins)
Leicester pocket the points! It’s a nice little move: Tielemans’ pass infield to Gray, running from the centre to the left; Gray’s dummy; Vardy’s first-time pass; Gray’s pull-back; Vardy’s finish, which lacks punch but has enough precision.
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87 mins: A rare non-stoppage: Tomkins’ tackle on Vardy is absolute precision.
86 mins: Morgan’s first impact is on Benteke’s head. Free kick.
84 mins: Somehow it felt like there were very few stoppages in the first half, but the second half has been almost entirely stoppage. Leicester bring Wes Morgan on in place of Barnes.
83 mins: Cahill is bleeding from a head wound. It might be the same one he suffered back in the 66th minute, recently reopened, or a new one. It’s so very hard to tell.
81 mins: Soyuncu is booked now, or a foul on McCarthy.
80 mins: Meyer takes on a defender but loses it; Barnes takes on a defender but loses it. There’s been a lot of unsuccessful taking-on today.
77 mins: Palace roll the dice. James McCarthy replaces James McCarthur, confusingly, and Christian Benteke replaces Ayew.
76 mins: It remains a frustratingly scrappy game. Zaha cuts onto his left foot but Evans blocks it, and then when the ball rebounds into the air beats Ayew to that as well.
74 mins: The afternoon’s first substitution sees Kouyate come off and Max Meyer come on. Leicester meanwhile take Perez off and bring on Demarai Gray.
72 mins: Zaha finds Ward on the right of the area. He cuts inside, but his left-footer from the edge of the area is held by Schmeichel (and had to be, with McArthur closing down maniacally, arms whirling in desperation).
69 mins: Palace want a penalty! A corner is headed to Schlupp on the edge of the area, whose shot comes off Chilwell. They think he used his hand. He didn’t.
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66 mins: Palace win a free kick just inside the Leicester half. Milivojevic tosses it into the area, where four players rise to head it and three head each other. Cahill, Kouyate and Evans all require treatment, but all appear to have survived the experience.
63 mins: Tomkins tackles Vardy as the striker threatens to run clear, and then handles to make sure he doesn’t take the ball right back again. Another booking.
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60 mins: Had the ball not flicked off Van Aanholt, it may well have been cleared. But the real issues took place behind him, with an emphatic lack of attention. Anyway, Van Aanholt tries to make up for it with a shot from 30 yards, but though vicious it’s also off-target.
GOAL! Crystal Palace 0-1 Leicester (Soyuncu, 57 mins)
Um, marking, anyone? Maddison’s corner dips at the near post, skims off the head of Van Aanholt and finds Soyuncu in the middle, entirely alone, and stooping to head in from six yards. At no stage in the defender’s run from the edge of the area was anyone paying him any attention whatsoever!
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56 mins: Save! Maddison’s corner lands on the head of Evans, eight yards out. His header is goalbound but straight down the middle, and Guaita tips it over the bar!
55 mins: It’s a fine cross, but Ward heads it clear.
54 mins: The referee gets his book out again, deciding that Schlupp pulled back Pereirra. Leicester have a hand free kick on the right flank.
51 mins: Oooh! Kouyate now pops up on the right, and his low cross is missed by Ayew at the near post and then prevented from presenting a tap-in at the far by Pereira’s outstretched toe.
48 mins: Kouyate nicks the ball from Ndidi on the edge of the area, then as it rolls away he gets to it again just before a Leicester player. This time Evans arrives late and leaves him emphatically flattened, Evans becoming the first player to be booked today.
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46 mins: Peeeeeep! Leicester start the second half with a hearty lump down the left and into touch.
The players are back out, and ready for more. Maddison emerges from the tunnel engaged in very chummy conversation with the referee.
“With both sides comfortable counter attacking, do the conditions help either in this spectacle?” wonders Roger Allen. “I’m thinking Palace edges it as the home side, enjoying showery conditions slowing the visitors up marginally. As I am following this via MBM only here in the States, I was trying to get a sense of the atmospherics.” It has been raining, but not very strongly. It isn’t particularly windy in London today. In short, I’d say the conditions aren’t making much of a difference.
It hasn’t been the wonderful advert for English top-flight football that we were all hoping for. A goal might liven things up, he wrote hopefully.
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Half time: Crystal Palace 0-0 Leicester City
45+2 mins: Zaha skips away from Pereira again and the referee blows his whistle again, but this time it’s for half-time!
45+1 mins: There will be one minute of stoppage time, though it’s been a game of very few stoppages.
44 mins: Van Aanholt takes a very strange free kick, which Tomkins controls with his arm, and Leicester have a free kick of their own.
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43 mins: Zaha is taken out with maximum cynicism by Pereira, trying to stop the winger from making it into the penalty area. He gets away without a booking, and even has the temerity to shake his head at the referee in apparent frustration.
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40 mins: Palace have had a shot on target now! Zaha is tackled in the area but the ball rolls out to Schlupp, whose effort deflects into the air and would have dropped under the bar had Schmeichel not tipped it over.
39 mins: Tielemans’ super pass takes out four opponents but is fractionally too long for Vardy.
35 mins: Hodgson may not think his Palace are a counter-attacking team, but they’re certainly playing like one. Leicester have had 63% of possession so far, all the corners and every shot on target.
33 mins: Maddison, fouled by Ayew, lifts the free kick towards Pereira, whose last-minute dash into the box has gone untracked. It doesn’t find him, but Guaita and Cahill do get into a bit of a mess about who should deal with the ball, and as a result neither of them do. It bounces wide of an empty goal.
30 mins: Tielemans shoots over from Maddison’s low corner. So far we’ve had lots of rushed shooting, but little precision or quality.
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28 mins: Perez runs unto Vardy’s header and sprints from his own half into space behind the Palace defence. Barnes is the only team-mate to offer any support, though, and he insists on running and staying offside so Perez has to go on alone, and Van Aanholt eventually gets back to tackle.
27 mins: Of greater concern to Kasper Schmeichel is the torrent of crumpled red and blue paper which is being tossed into his goalmouth by fans in the stand behind the goal.
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26 mins: A succession of inaccurate crosses from Palace ends with Van Aanholt’s inaccurate shot.
22 mins: At the other end McArthur cuts in from the right, scuffs his way past a couple of challenges and then shoots wide from the 18-yard line, with Zaha over to the left gesticulating and screaming in frustration and anguish at being ignored.
20 mins: Now a Leicester corner is won by Evans, who heads over from 10 yards.
19 mins: Chance for Leicester! It starts with a fabulous first-time flick from Barnes in his own half, which finds Maddison. His ball to Vardy is also great, and he hares into the left side of the area and, with Perez sprinting to offer him a crossing option, hits the goalkeeper.
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17 mins: Palace win a free kick deep on the right, which Milivojevic curls over the area and out of play for a goal kick.
14 mins: Palace’s 4-5-1 is frustrating Leicester so far, with the visitors failing to find any space in the attacking third (Van Aanholt dozing excepted).
12 mins: A dozing Van Aanholt has his pocket picked by Perez, and is lucky that the resulting low cross picks out a defender, and is cleared.
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10 mins: And another Ayew shot! Zaha’s fine pass with the outside of his right foot sets him off, but he should probably have instead tried to feed McArthur as he burst into the box. Instead he has a wild effort of his own, from 20-odd yards.
8 mins: A sniff for Palace! Ayew passes to Zaha on the left, who gives it to Schlupp, whose backheel finds Ayew again, but his shot in blocked.
8 mins: A couple of tasty challenges: Cahill’s elbow smacks Perez’s head on the way down from winning a header, and a few moments later Tielemans trips Ayew. Neither is worth a caution.
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5 mins: Shot! Leicester burst forward on the break, Tielemans passes to Barnes on the left, and his right-footed shot from just outside the area is straight at Guaita.
5 mins: Palace work the ball into the Leicester area, but once there McArthur is swiftly dispossessed.
3 mins: Little action as yet. Leicester have had a gentle foray down the right and a half-hearted push down the left.
1 min: Peeeeep! Crystal Palace gt the game started, with the traditional hoof down the left flank.
In case you’re wondering why Crystal Palace’s players are wearing black armbands today, the club says this is in memory of “dear friend and colleague Ady, who sadly passed away yesterday”. Adem Gredelj was their first team security officer. There’s a tiny bit more info here.
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And out they come! We’re just moments away from actual action now!
The players are in the tunnel, Palace eschewing the modern trend of emerging in zip-up keep-warm long-sleeved training tops to just go with short sleeves from the off.
I can’t even begin to offer an explanation for this:
On Sky, Andy Hinchliffe is then asked for his thoughts on the game. “They are a counter-attacking team, Crystal Palace,” he says. Fight!
Roy Hodgson also has a natter. He’s feeling very chatty indeed: a couple of gentle prods from the interviewer and he’s off:
Wilf can play on either side, there’s no problem with that at all. He’s equally effective on either side and he’s playing well for us so we trust him to do a good job for us whichever side I choose to play him on. The fact is we aren’t blessed with a lot of goalscorers, everyone knows that. The ones we got are doing a good enough job, I think.
I hear us described as a counter-attacking team but I don’t think that’s an accurate description. We don’t have a particularly low block. We play quite high at the back, as high as probably any team in the league, and we are quite happy to get forward and we have midfield players who are good on the ball. So if sometimes we have been forced into counter-attacking mode it’s because Man City are very good with the ball, as were Arsenal in the second half, and it’s not easy to get it back sometimes.
I’m sure they’ve been delighted with that result. It’s a nice thing to enjoy, I’m sure they’re buoyed by it and it must have done wonders for the team’s confidence. But quite often this year we’ll be playing a team on the back of a good result and they’ll come here very confidently. It’s a question of our preparation, our desire, our hunger, our preparation, our ability if you like to put the pieces of our game together that we need to put together.If we can do that I think we’re in for a good game.
Brendan Rodgers has a chat:
The consistency of the team’s important. We’ve tweaked it a few times but in the main the consistency has been there. The last four games against Palace Leicester have lost, so we have an opportunity today to change that. We have a great group of players.
The idea is to keep improving, keep developing. It’s a game of patience.We’ll need to be persistent int he game. They’ve only conceded three and score four at home. So it’s probably going to be a tight game. We need to work the ball, keep our patience, keep our tactical discipline. If it’s tight we’ve got to stay calm and if the opportunities come we need to take them. The key for us is to perform well.
The teams
Today’s teams are in! Leicester stick with the side that smashed Southampton, Palace bring in Schlupp against his former club, plus Guaita in goal. Townsend and Hennessey drop out:
Crystal Palace: Guaita, Ward, Tomkins, Cahill, van Aanholt, Zaha, Kouyate, Milivojevic, McArthur, Schlupp, Ayew. Subs: Dann, Meyer, Hennessey, Benteke, McCarthy, Victor Camarasa, Kelly.
Leicester: Schmeichel, Ricardo Pereira, Evans, Soyuncu, Chilwell, Ndidi, Perez, Tielemans, Maddison, Barnes, Vardy. Subs: Justin, Morgan, Gray, Albrighton, Ward, Iheanacho, Praet.
Referee: Paul Tierney.
Here’s the referee, Paul Tierney, performing the ancient and mystical “Touching of the Ball” ceremony at Selhurst Park earlier today.
Hello world!
Crystal Palace have run Leicester ragged over the last two seasons, doing the double over them twice and racking up 3-0, 4-1 and 5-0 wins along the way (along with a scrappy 1-0 win at Selhurst Park last December in which Luka Milivojevic scored with their only shot on target). But the day after the teams last met in February Claude Puel was sacked, and for Leicester everything has changed since.
Under Brendan Rodgers this season the Foxes have lost just twice, at Old Trafford and Anfield, both times by a single (penalty) goal. So a third successive Palace double seems unlikely, but then achieving unlikely stuff is what has pushed them up to their current league position of ninth. Leicester would overtake Chelsea and go third if they win; Palace would move up one place with a draw but into fifth - fifth - if they win. Welcome all! Team news in a jiffy.
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