Crystal Palace 4 Wolves 2: Eddie Nketiah steps up as Mateta’s understudy as Selhurst Park puts on FA Cup after-party
SELHURST PARK put on an almighty FA Cup after-party as Crystal Palace brushed aside Wolves and made more history.
After winning the first trophy in the club’s history only 72 hours earlier, Oliver Glasner claimed another record by taking the Eagles past 50 points in the Premier League for the first time.
Eddie Nketiah’s brace and Ben Chilwell’s first goal for the club, as well as another for Eberechi Eze, saw them past Wolves despite what must have been a few days of well-deserved celebrations.
The result was another thing to celebrate, though this night had little to do with the actual football.
Eagles fans had celebrated loud and proud under the Wembley arch, and now got to do it all over again.
No one likes the fact that the Cup final was not the final game of the domestic season – but an evening like this is a persuasive argument for having it earlier.
Palace will have a trophy parade in south London on Monday, but this was a proper party at their place.
Fans arrived early – many still in a happy daze.
They were streaming out of the club shop with their limited edition Cup winners shirts.
Bumper match day programmes, with the FA Cup on the front and emotional words from Marc Guehi, Steve Parish and Glasner, were being snapped up alongside commemorative scarves.
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Parish, the chairman, gushed: “Saturday felt like a coming of age, the day we announced ourselves as a ‘proper football club’.”
He was flanked in the stands by Mark Bright and former boss Alan Pardew, all with beaming smiles still fixed in place.
Selhurst Park has long been the most atmospheric stadium in the capital, but it has rarely been this colourful and united, all four sides bouncing to their new ditty of “12th again, who gives a f***? We’ve won the FA Cup!”
The Holmesdale End ran through the chants for each and every one of their Cup heroes – with the rest of the stadium following their lead.
Red and blue balloons, as well as a few blow-up FA Cups, were tossed around the stands – where almost every fan had come in their colours.
Substitutes were given huge ovations on their way to the dugout before Palace were led out by Ward, carrying his five-day old daughter, ahead of his final home game for the club.
Glasner had tried to give the players as long as possible to celebrate Saturday’s triumph – not getting them back to prepare for this until Monday afternoon.
He made seven changes, Guehi and Adam Wharton missing out with concussion injuries from the weekend and a couple of others on the bench likely still nursing sore heads for different reasons.
For the most part it was easy to forget there was a game being played out in front of everyone.
Selhurst sang about Saturday, about Glasner and their upcoming European tour.
There was some football to enjoy along with the celebrations, however.
Wolves took the lead through Emmanuel Agbadou, heading in after Jorgen Strand Larsen had nodded a corner across goal.
Nketiah tried to clear but could not stop the ball before it had crossed the line.
The Eagles No9 more than made up for that a moment later. The Wolves goal had not stopped the Palace party – but Nketiah took it up a notch.
Signed from Arsenal last summer, the striker had just one Premier League goal all season before tonight, but suddenly grabbed two in just five minutes.
Nketiah first dispatched Romain Esse’s cutback with a well taken first-time finish before meeting an Ismaila Sarr cross six yards out – which came after some typically restless work from Daniel Munoz.
There were still more feel-good stories after the break.
Chilwell, a January signing from Chelsea, scored his first in red and blue when his free-kick took a heavy deflection off Agbadou in the Wolves wall and found the bottom corner.
Wolves grabbed another back, Strand Larsen nodding in unmarked from Jean-Ricner Bellegarde’s corner and Dean Henderson put on another display of the heroics which had denied Manchester City, saving from Goncalo Guedes.
No one was concerned whether Wolves would get level or not, but Eze made sure with a superb goal from the bench.
Ward, who had collected a farewell card from the referee for a trip on Matheus Cunha, provided the most emotional moment of the night.
Substituted in the 70th minute, the Eagles legend fell to his knees in the centre circle and could not stop the tears and neither could Parish watching from the stands.
The right-back is departing after 13 years and could never have imagined he would do so to the sound of chants about him lifting the Cup.
This was a night of celebration and saying goodbye, but another which showed Palace are going places.