There is a great sense of dejection and negativity among Crystal Palace fans after somehow seeing them fall to a 1-0 defeat by Aston Villa in a game that was deemed a “must-not-lose encounter”.

There was great cause for optimism ahead of the game as they faced an out-of-sorts Villa struggling to score and failing to keep clean sheets, not to mention the fact Palace have come off two fantastic results against Liverpool and Swansea.

It looked as though Palace were going to cruise to victory after a dominant opening 30 minutes. Ironically, the ever-reliable Scott Dann was to be at fault in a game where he was being watched by England scouts after finally gaining some recognition.

It is astonishing Palace failed to win a game they dominated from the first minute to the last. Palace’s usually fluid attack threatened to be dangerous but more often than not led to disappointment, as was typified by the consistently woeful final passes of Yannick Bolasie and Wilfried Zaha, not to mention the 100 per cent success rate of hitting the first man at corners by Joel Ward.

Marouane Chamakh and James McArthur were the only two who put in respectable performances, which goes without saying; the two possess a sense of class and calmness on the ball that no one else can match. Palace need an out-and-out centre forward; our lack of urgency in the summer market is starting to prove rather costly.

While Dwight Gayle has natural goalscoring instincts, he lacks physicality and fitness. Fraizer Campbell, on the other hand, continues to offer close to nothing. He’s lazy, wasteful and seems to spend most of his time on the wings instead of sniffing around the box.

One can only hope Warnock resurrects interest in Connor Wickham, who is available on the cheap due to being in the final year of his contract and looks in no hurry to renew his deal. Perhaps his goalscoring record could be better, but he offers a wealth of strength and endeavour as well as the added bonus that he’s only 21 (four years younger than Gayle).

Palace look nothing close to the animal they have been at home in previous seasons and this could solely be down to our “new-and-improved” playing surface, which in fact couldn’t be any further from being improved at all.

The flanks were just churned up and there are several mini-molehills dotted around the pitch that are large enough to trip Barry Bannan. A disappointing seven points have been picked up in as many matches at Selhurst this season and only one from Burnley, Villa and Sunderland combined.

It is more than likely that we are going to be in and around the relegation dog-fight come the end of the season if we fail to overcome our stale displays at Selhurst.

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