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The young one. Travis, how you doing? I'm good. I'm good. Welcome back. Obviously, it was a fact that just before he led in to say, I will, he rolled his sleeves up. Oh, yeah. Did he need this? Look a deep breath. To do it best in the destination of his dad. Well, there's a hair and everything. Well done. And Kevin Day. Hello. How are you? I'm all right. I'm all right. And bonus point. That's absolute bonus point. Yeah, I'm beating four games. I'm beating what's best team in the league. What's your party for England again? Here we go. Shall we start there then? I should start with me because we've been joined by Andy Street who's going to be late as a surprise. So Andy Street is going to join some parts. Yeah. Yeah. Because he's suing somebody. Well, he can come back and talk about how good Hennessy was in the Arsenal and everything games in part two. Well, yes, except, and I seem to be the only person who thinks this, but clearly the Arsenal girl is his fault. OK. OK. If he'd stayed on his line, he's played, and yes, he's played very well against Everton and Arsenal. And I'm very pleased for him because I think he's always been a bit of goalkeeper and Andy Street would have his belief. Yeah. But he didn't have to rush off his line. If he stayed where he was. That was a very good ball into the box. Yeah, it was a good ball into the box. But I thought it was interesting in a way it's encouraging that he isn't getting stick because five games ago, everyone had been going absolutely crazy. Do you think he would have done if we'd lost one deal? No, I think it would have been five games ago if we hadn't had the performances we've had because he's been part of the very encouraging upturn in the past couple of weeks. Yeah. And clearly the back four. But again, Travis knows it's better than I do because he's played football at a much higher level. But you don't know which comes first. You don't know whether the back four confidence comes from Hennessy or his confidence comes from them or whether it's just pure coincidence or whether they like it that the clocks have gone forward. You don't know. Yeah. But for whatever the reason, the back four and the goalkeeper are clearly, clearly paying better as a unit than midfield are more tenacious. Or is it simply because we've managed to get a couple of clean sheets in there? Well, again, that's the encouraging thing that's been almost overlooked is that not only have we gone from two points in 14 games where it is to six points in four, but within that it's two clean sheets where we didn't have any for 12 games. And I presume it's what we've always talked about is that we get the first one and the other one for a little bit. The fact is as well, we've gone from six games in the spin losing at home to winning one and drawing one. And the way points have been at Arsenal, West Ham, and I don't care what sort of dip Arsenal, West Ham moving in form, you don't have to look at the league table and their results to see that they are really difficult places to get points from. And in both games, we were a goal down as well. Yes. Which is actually everything we talked about long and hard is that we've lost that lack of coming back from those sorts of situations. Well, it felt to me for the first time, I guess in the West Ham, but certainly in the Arsenal game, it felt like for the first time since 2015, even a goal down, it felt like we're still in this. I think we can still get back into this regardless of the possessions. What's been encouraging to you, then, Travis, in the last couple of games? It's the confidence of the whole team. It just seems like we've settled down again. At the beginning of the season, we hit the full running and it was goals, goals, winning games, picking up points here and there weren't losing an awful lot. And then all the injuries happened, it all fell to pieces. But it feels like for the past two games, our back five has been good. For the past three games, Hennessy's picked it up again. I think that goal on the weekend was a mix of Swari, Dan and Hennessy. I think it was all three of them, could have all done better. But the midfield, Jeddin Akk has taken his time to find his feet again, but I think he's done that and he's looking like a better player again. Yeah, just for Kebai, you know, he's still not the very beginning of the season, but it just feels like our team is a bit more stable at the moment and it's helping us a lot. There isn't player's job at the team often. I think as well, it obviously helps that more and more players are available again because now Paju can make changes because he wants to, because he has mixed and matched a little bit. Certainly in the midfield and up from, he still went back to 4-4-2 option in the first half on Sunday, which none of us agree with, but he's been making changes because he's been able to, not because he has to, so it's not suddenly putting the square pegs in the round holes, it's just that he's got the opportunity to go right, I'll use this player for that game. And something, I know Paju has been very keen to stress the importance of that meeting on the Friday night before the West Ham game. The clear-the-air meeting, which apparently is in no way about Adebai or his wages, but is about, whatever the meeting was about, Paju and his, of course, he's taking the credit for it, but he's indicating that that's what's led to this change, but it is interesting. Just the body language and the demeanor, he's just even there by all laughing on the touchline with the other subs. It just seems to be a bit more freedom, a bit more relaxed. The whole thing just seems to be more relaxed. Yeah, it just seems to be, and obviously the Norwich result helped, but since, especially since, it just seems to be a little weight off the shelves. Did we, did we have a panic a bit as fans? I think, I think it's too soon, I think once the season's over, I think we probably will say that we did, yeah, I think we probably will say that we forgot how well we did before Christmas. But if you think about it, the points that we have picked up in the last few games, you looking at Newcastle and Sunderland, winning a couple of games, and if we haven't picked up these six points before, it could look a lot different now, and we could still be packing. I think you're entitled to panic when you've only got two points, and when you're the last team in the whole of the entire football pyramid, and it's interesting, I did a little talk on Sport and Sunday, and they were really interested in this idea that no one seriously talked about Pargy being sacked, which again is good, but I was that. I think it's because kindly fans, maybe I'm more sensible than other fans, and when you look at it in the cold light of day, you can't suddenly go from being the best in the calendar year, however you count it last year, at the end of one season at the start of the next, you were the second best team in the country, and he built up enough credit for that, and I think fans realised also because fans saw the games as well, and we've said this before, apart from Villa and apart from Bournemouth, and maybe a little bit, we weren't outplayed, it was just an element, we were always in the game, so I think people could see what was happening, but I still think it was just hard to, everyone saw his fault in a few things, but it wasn't predominantly just down to him. As we said last week, as Gordon Strickard said, if at any time you've got K'Vie, Velassie, K'vie, Wicca, McCarth, Punch, and Missing, any team's going to struggle, but I still think it's interesting, even allowing for those things, I tell other teams who would have set the manager, and we've seen somebody show up, it's been 13 managers' sets between Christmas and now, across the divisions, and some of the managers would be there. There were some Palace fans who were saying that, there was never been tugging cheeks sometimes. Yeah, there was never really a sort of prop of ground as well, the thing is they wouldn't have been Palace fans wanting them to go if we finished six, because there's fans like that at every club, because again, the other thing that Leicester have done is put pressure on it, because now, next season, everyone likes West Brom fans again, and we go, "Well, why can't we win the league?" That sort of put pressure on the rest of the managers, if you like, including Pargy, but no, there was never, I mean, you never heard, there was no concerted chance, of course there are always tweets and stuff, but they never take the seriously, and interestingly most of the tweets are sort of all kind of shouted down by it, because, and let's face it, we would have been here, because I was saying before Christmas, I wanted Pargy to stay for five years, I wanted him to be able to infrastructure from top to bottom, so it'd be a bit, having said that, I still think if we'd lost to West Ham and Norwich, he'd be, I'd be, "Well, that does come a tipping point at some point, that has to be", but clearly, I think we all agreed that the players never seem to lose faith in him, but, and I would love to know what happened at that fateful meeting on the Friday night, but I think we'll ever find out, unfortunately, but I thought, as well, I thought Eddie by all looked, five times better than he had done before, when he came up, he looked, you know, I wonder if it, I wanted to establish your faith, but you think, do you think that's what it was, yeah, definitely he's someone that you can just watch him, but everything he does, he thrives, he thrives off people that like him, runs with the early Ronaldo when he was at Man United, when he was getting booed and torn to shreds, especially after Euro 2004, the Rooney incident, completely torn to shreds, but thrived off it and played better because of it, and added by all it, just when he scored the goal for City, he runs all the way up just to wind up the other team, he likes, he likes being the centre of attention, whether it's positive, oh, and there you say, any attention to good attention, and that's something with him, and when he picked up that ball, would he run half the length of the pitch, and he's held it up, passed the blessing, and boom, goal, and just think, there we go, he's going to go home and have a good night's sleep and have a smile on his face now, because he's come off the bench, soaked up the boos, and then given an assist, yeah, sounds like your dead coming off the bench, but what was encouraging about added by all, and I thought you'd probably try to respond right, that he was pumped up, it was Arsenal, but that run he made, that energy, that power, and that pace, you think that's closer to the added by all we thought we were getting, yeah, and I know he's put some good headers in, especially towards the end against Everton, but you kind of think if he could do that in the middle of the pitch, that's the player we thought we were getting, because again, that's the other thing, you kind of forget how good a player he was, because he was, it was unplayable at the time, and you didn't office it, but what he chose to do that, yeah, his whole stature gives off a weird impression, unless he is playing really well, you just think, how's this guy, it's a bit like a Pete Crutch thing sometimes, he looks a bit angly sometimes, and then he does make a right, do you think, how on earth has the ball stayed so close to his feet, and you think, actually, no, he's really good, but then, how does he show off next time? Well, Pete Crutch, a Pete Crutch is shitting, yeah, that's the result, to really put that actually, he's got a deceptively good player on the ground. So, is that by all given you guys any hint that we should even think about keeping him in the summer? No, I haven't had that for him until now. No. Oh, he still picked Wickem over him, if he was fair. Not if we had to pay all his wages, and it was that much money, but it's given me hope that it sounds like you'll probably start at Old Traf tomorrow night, and... Well, all three of his goals against when you know it will come up with Trafic, and really... That's a good start. That's a great start. But also, it gives you a bit more hope for the semi-final, because he's definitely an other option, I mean, if he's only fit enough to play half an hour, I mean, that's a good option to have. Yeah. So, were we lucky against Arsenal, Travis, or was it just sort of a good solid defensive display, because we didn't have much support? I think it was, look, I think it was defensive. We've been sound, it's a delay now in my mind, the match. Swarry had a lot better game than you did, as Hennessy pulled off a couple of amazing saves, the one with the shoulder against Wellbeck. Yeah. And I just... It was... At times, previously this season, we've been in those situations, I think we've been riding a lot a bit when we've managed to not concede, or not concede in those last 15 minutes, we've been quite bad at that. But this game, it looked like we were sort of... It looked like the team on the Pughless a little bit, that we didn't actually look like we were going to concede. They ask noise at the thing that they have to ball and they keep it in your third a lot, but they never seem to really look very threatening at all. I think their first shot on target was the header, wasn't it, from Sanchez? Yeah. And also, their goal. I never felt worried from gymnastics, didn't it? Yeah. So, it wasn't really that appropriate as us giving the ball away. Yes. It's difficult to tell what's on TV, because you don't get a sort of picture of the whole shape of the game, but I don't think we were lucky. And I think more importantly, none of the Arsenal fans, or Wenger said we were lucky. And basically, what all the Arsenal fans said was they've seen that game played 30 times. Yeah, I'm sure they have. That's the same thing I've asked them for the last 10 seasons, isn't it? And they're the team, their stats, I can't remember what it is, but they keep the lead less long than the other team in the Premier League. And they invariably score the first goal, can't get the second one. And the fact is, at the end, we look more likely to score than they did. It was very encouraging, it was very encouraging. And it's no point denying it was a defensive performance, that's a perfectly valid part of the game. Absolutely. And Pargy afterwards, I thought was really interesting in his analysis when he said we thought they might score the first goal, but we looked at them playing and we've seen that the longer you hang on, the more likely it is going to be the way team that scores the second goal. And that Hennessy's favor, the shoulder's really interesting as he didn't get half the credit he deserved for that save. No. I think that much of the day commentator was the one who said, you know, smacked him when the shoulder. It was a great save. He was out. He sped his body so well. But Hennessy's reaction was really quick and he spread himself really quick, so that was a genuine save. And there is no doubt with Hennessy much, I do think he was partly to fool, but as was swearing, he has really improved and it's interesting as well that Dan gave an interview to the standard last week when he talked about basically nothing but Hennessy saying what a brave keeper he was because he knew he'd put his hand up in the dressing room and knew that he'd made mistakes. That's interesting. And he was clearly implying that Pargy would say to him, "Well, first of all, let's go keep it, don't worry about it," but he said Hennessy put his hand up, admitted he'd made mistakes and just kept playing. And I think, do you know what, I had this conversation with somebody the other day, a palace fan I bumped into on the tube happens a lot, but it might be, it might just be, you know, that we talk about Hennessy in the future the way we talk about Jules and his first half a season for us, that it might be that he just does settle down and become a really good goalkeeper. Because Pargy has a lot of faith in him and I wouldn't be surprised if we don't, if we would probably we'll get another keeper in, but not to be first choice. I would, I'd... Do you guys do? Because we've seen this pop of four and we might have to look at a new keeper and stuff. What I can give a Pargy really, really rates him and we've known, we've talked about Pargy's stubbornness before. I don't think we'll be looking for another keeper and off the back of the recent performances, I'm less fast about that than I would have been saying February or March. And I think logically, if we can improve the depth of the back four, you know, I don't, I think Hennessy's probably low down a list of probabilities of problems, I think. I'd rather strengthen the left back here in the goalkeeper and things like that at the moment. Yeah, but even Suarez suddenly in the last couple of games looks like he's capable of defending and, but they are clearly, it looks to me, regardless of the mythical Friday night meeting, it looks like they've done a lot of work on the training pitch, just in terms of the back four. I don't know if they have, but it just looks like they're, they're more cohesive, they're more together as a unit and their first priority is defense at the moment. And I think Travis is rather than two, the two centre backs are back to their touch with a back to their sort of early season form, and you know, Delaney's never going to be a footballer, it's in the back, but he's back to that, it's almost like Robert Hoof type, you know, whatever, by whatever means, you've got to work really hard to get, to get past them. Yeah. Delaney also had a amazing game against Reading as well, and that was his turnaround in the season, I think, for him getting back into the form years now. And it's the whole back form, it's just, it's so much easier to watch, so it's less stressful to watch. And Hennessy, the one thing I have to say about Hennessy, he's done amazingly well because in the past few home games, in the past month, there has been some of the Julian Sperroni chance coming from this thing, and I hate that, you know, if Hennessy's in goal, you support Hennessy. But in the past couple of weeks, you know, there's been a couple of arguments and stance, people have started singing his name again, and that type of thing has built his confidence as well. We just need to give players a bit more time. I mean, he's well as his number one, he's a big lad, he's got a great, great distribution of the ball. In fact, in what the game was, the Norwich game wasn't too good there. But I mean, he's got the whole package, and it's always been a bit odd, I've always found it hard to not like him in a way. He's made loads of mistakes, and it's all pointing in the direction, like, well, he's sporting scope. There's always been something about him I've liked, and it's finally proven in the past couple of weeks. That's been fair, he hasn't been the only one making mistakes. I know, it's been a lot of people, and the things as well with Dan and Delaney, for all the praise that we've given them, I would still hope to bring in another centre back. I think that has happened just purely because of Delaney's age. Yeah, I mean, I would love, yeah, I've got for a bit of his distances, but I'm sure he'd understand that I would love, if Delaney was Hangieland, I would love Delaney to be the first choice reserved, you see, I mean, I'd love him in the squad. Who do you think is listening, Delaney or Hangiel? Yeah, either of them. Oh, OK. I don't think either of them listened to the pod. Delaney? He says he tells you and that, but... No, no, no, no, no. What's he told you in podcast, isn't it? Yeah, it does not. I've got several of them, much, but you know. There's questions about frashing Charlton in that particular pod. I don't think Breddon and Breddon is, he's not even on Twitter, Breddon is having a... I think he avoids all kind of reading philosophy somewhere. Exactly. Exactly. I think Delaney would be a really important squad member. I think the other thing with the back four, especially with the two central defenders, is the fact that whoever's been playing in central midfield has been better in the past five or six games as well, which is always going to improve the centre backs a lot. They're always going to play better if they're not having to deal with as much as they have been dealing. Well, goodbye has paid a lot better, isn't it? Goodbye has. You know, hats off to Jeddingard, really, because we were one of the many people that were saying thanks and goodbye to Jeddard. And none of us said it with a light heartedly, and we're all sad to say, but you really have to admire the character of that man, because he's turned it around. And he's not going to be coming a better player, but just doing what he does, doing it really well. He's kind of increasingly, you need somebody like that. But for the way we play, he's brilliant. And it's just, again, it comes back to that, what we talked about before, it lifts the confidence for all the other players when he's out there, because he's like the boss on the pitch. But the only problem I kind of have with him is he's one of those players. I don't think if we want to move forward as a club, I think he's one of those players that will have to come off the bench, I think, sometimes. But he doesn't keep up his standard, if he's not playing, week out. He's not one of those players you can bring on, because as soon as McArthur and Kebaia pushed them out of the team for the first half of the season, got injured, he came back and he has taken him a month and a half to get back to where he was again. And then once McArthur now comes back, I presume those two might finish off the rest of the season, McArthur and Kebaia, it might drop off in the next season, it's the same story again, it takes a while to get back into it. Yes, I should add a caveat to what I just said about Jeddon is that as much as I acknowledge what our character is, again, he's one of those players who, next season, you hope he's a squad player, not, because he's one of several positions that we need. So we still think, despite this upturner form, we still need changes. Despite all the excuses we've made, and we've done it tonight for the bad runner form, you can't ignore two points from four, you can't ignore that runner form, and of course, if we want to move forward, because we know that next season, every club is going to be buying better players because they've got the money to do so, and we're simply going to have to be one of those. We'll have to improve just to stand still. Or is it more that you have to prepare for these issues? Yeah, well, that's another thing, is that you kind of hope that they've learned a lesson from the January transfer window, and that they will have transfer targets in mind. But then again, see, I don't know how much of it, yeah, I presume it's easier to sell a club who are 15th, than it is to sell a club who have just avoided relegation, but you'd like to think they've got targets in mind, and it does sound from what the club have been saying, and from certain press reports that we've improved our scouting facility. January is a hard month to buy players, so it's a real height on the market. It's a mess, really, isn't it? It is, it is, but, and again, there are arguments, either way, because Norwich spent a lot of money and it hasn't really helped them, but I think they should have done better in a time, but I absolutely agree, and clubs hate the transfer window, but there was a massive element of complacency, and just bringing out the boy win wasn't enough, but having said that, they would argue, why would they bring him extra wages, but pay extra money when the team would do that? And it looks like it's pretty much done the job anyway, too, and it's still there. And he's been good for us again, that's a fair point to our associates. We were talking about the back four, and then we moved on, and I forgot to mention, I've made a note, and I forgot to mention it, Joel Ward, because we talked about him in previous pods and saying, well, maybe he's not quite up to scratch anymore, what do you think of him in the last couple of games, Kevin? Do you think he's claiming a spot back or, or again, another player that needs to be replaced in the summer? Joel Ward, when he's at his best, is a really good Premier League defender, it's just for whatever reasons, we haven't seen him at his best, and he hasn't been as good for Pajoo as he was for Pula's, I don't think, but I still think I would be perfectly happy. Dan and Ward would be the two I would be, I wouldn't worry about keeping. None of them, look, if we were to start the season with the same back four, I wouldn't be that unhappy, but we know that left back is an issue, we know that we need another centre back, but I think Joel Ward is slowly in his way back to where he was, and again, I don't know if it's confidence, I don't know if it's training on whatever it is, that Friday night meeting, who knows, it might have been him. The more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more difficult thing he knows. The more you mention it, it's the more difficult thing he knows. The more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more difficult thing he knows. The more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more difficult thing he knows. The more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, the more you mention it, but I think he's slowly but surely getting back. Travis will know this better than I. It's sometimes hard, you don't know whether to criticize individuals in the back four or the back four, because you don't know which comes first, the tactical analysis of the unit or the individual performance of each player, because sometimes you look at teams like that, you know, A player in the back four can have an off day, but they still defend really well. Again, you don't know whether it's because people in front of all are working harder, but I think there's been really encouraging science from Joel Ward. Can I ask you this though, Travis, given that we've talked about, so I already been giving it on and off the board and Joel Ward, what does Martin Kelly got to do to get in the team? Did a good question. He scored against Tottenham, you know, he came and had a good game there, but I've always fancied him as more of a centre back and he fancies himself as more of a centre back as well. Maybe the man for next season, then if we're talking about the team, I don't know, I don't know. It's just these... Or, yeah, or anything. I don't know. I've always, I'm a fan of Pacey, right backs and left backs anyway, which Joel Ward and Martin Kelly both don't have, in my opinion. And I've said it before, I do believe that fall back at the present day is probably one of the most important positions on the whole pitch, because you pretty much dominate a whole flank at the moment, which is why Swari, I've always liked Swari, are those defensive work, hasn't been very good generally, but has improved. It's something that Joel Ward hasn't been able to offer us that much, which is the... I think if Joel Ward isn't the championship, he'd be very good because the pace isn't as high there. But I think that Joel Ward's often better suited as somebody who's almost in a yet-enact defensive hold and midfield position, because he's good on the ball. He gets into the position, he's good at the ball, it's feet, but it's just the pace that he doesn't have to be a right back. It's strange, though. But at the end of the day, he is solid and he does do his defensive job, and I'd rather have a right back that can defend rather than what it's... Or you've got exactly... Or you've got exactly... Swari and Ward at the other side. Yeah, basically. And I think that's probably been one of the problems in the three months that we weren't very good, is that it was totally unbalanced, because Swari was nearly always 20 yards ahead of Ward. And you've got three at the back. He's pushing out for something. Yeah. And the Leicester game was the classic example. The amount of space Swari's got down that left-hand side, because Swari's almost always in front of him. And Ward doesn't track back to back to back to back. And then he's coming across to try and get tomorrow, leaving a massive gap. But it's interesting to think about the fallback, because 20 years ago, the fallback was the player... The least good footballer was of... Oh, yeah. That's why I was the fallback. He was on the lead team. Oh, wait. I'm fullback now. But they were the players that didn't have to play football, even less than the centreback. And now it's something the fallbacks have to be footballers, but the Kelly thing's also interesting. Every Liverpool family talk to, every Palace family talk to, every England family talk to all say, "Yeah, Kelly's going to be a centreback." The only people who don't seem willing to take that risk on people who manage it, because no one's, for some reason, under what circumstances, no matter what circumstances are, he's not being given the centreback, and it's not just, "Pard you." So, I just wonder whether we've got the wrong end of the stick about Kelly's potential. He does well at fallback? He does. I think... It's a question, if you look back over 177 pods, which was Travis Borne, even one. I would say in the past 18 months, that question is probably one of the questions you've asked more than any other. What does Mike Kelly have to do? It's always a fact. It always comes the same question. It's like Travis says, "Whenever he does play, everyone goes, 'Oh, I think we've solved that problem.' It's like, after the top, when they're sitting in the cup, you go, 'All right, great.' And then, you just disappear again, and it disappears before it comes to you. So, whether it's with Pard you've stubbed on this, I don't know, well, clearly, you'd ever hear a peep out of him about wanting to leave. Not a couple of times, surely. I don't know what he said. Hang on. Do you've got to go? You'd think so, and you'd think, is he still young? You'd think you'd get a good... Especially without a chance, as well. Yeah, but the only chance he had was living for a while or a season. Yeah. He was talking about earlier, and he did the job then, it's just... Yeah. I mean, in fact, the opposite, in fact, the only time you ever hear anything from me is him saying, 'I'm really glad to be part of the squad,' and clearly there is something, but he looks... He looks... I mean, it's interesting, because tomorrow night we've hit these strange injuries that we've picked up the only last five days, that we can guarantee are going to be... Definitely going to be... Something like this. So, it might be that he gets a chance tomorrow night, but it strikes me that setback is a hard position to come into... I mean, you'd imagine if we've got real problems tomorrow, I didn't put anger on that, because it's a specialist position, isn't it? It's a hard one, because he had just sent the backs over the course of time, they do get a relationship, they do work together well. Yeah. And they like the keeper in a way, aren't they? They're the uppers. They're the uppers that we start. Yeah, yeah. Look at... John Terry's and things, you've always sent the backs that are players that have played the whole 90 minutes of the game. And that is down in fact, it's down in a delay any strength, isn't it? Yeah, it's a bit harsh. Absolutely, because, you know, Dan is a more footballing of the two, and Delaney's the proper old-fashioned stopper, that arguably, and he's only really sort of hoofed Morgan Delaney, there's not that many of them left in the Premier League, because everyone wants football and sent the backs to the backs, so yeah, basically, which I'm not entirely sure is, it seems to work quite well for Lester and for Delaney, I think there's still room for that. Yeah. That's sort of sent the back. But it is... it's mystified because, as I say, it's Kelly, whether he's left back or right back, you know, he looks all right, everywhere, but yeah, you presume it's a discussion he has with, I don't know if he was at the Friday night meeting, I don't know if he decided well, we're here, boss. That's taken for now. Can we... Well, we're here. Can I just raise a question? I can't imagine that. But he's... You imagine, he's clearly part of the plans. So I was going to come into this pod and, you know, before the last 10 minutes on Sunday, ask what's happened to Yannick Balassie recently, because he's been probably one of our poorest players. But then he scores that goal. I think we know what's happened. It's just been played out of position, it's hard, you bafflingly trying to keep on with this experiment, the player, and as soon as he switched it against him, as soon as he goes on to win. As soon as he goes back on the wing and we play one up front, he looks much better, the shape looks much better, much more offensive. It's interesting that he's clearly decided that Zaha needs a bit of a rest and isn't going to start games, but as, you know, that last 20 minutes, it looked like palletive old Balassie and Zaha firing on all cylinders and both legs. And you just look, it's so difficult to defend against them, I mean, the goal was great, but again, that was mainly added by all's power. I think, I just think Chek was beaten by the Chek expected it in the other corner, he didn't expect it. Yeah, did it set the power, it's such a clean connection with the shots. Well, also, he watched the ring for that and the way it's moved through the air, it's hard to stop. He got hand to it as well. He did, but you'd guess Travis has already probably didn't expect him to shoot because you know, punches goal notwithstanding against Norwich. I imagine that most people who scout pallets will go, they seem to be terrifying to shoot in. But the way we're picking up, it looks like we have a corner. So yeah, but Sakow is the only one who literally seems to try to shot and apart from these guards, we don't, we're not a team that try our luck from outside the box. Yeah, so I don't think I've never been expecting it, but, and then again, you saw in the last minute with Sahago for this, so difficult, they're both so difficult to defend against. Yeah. And I've said, well, Paju does deserve credit that he's probably not getting because the West Ham Anna Arsenal to away against him, he really made really offensive changes. They're really positive attacking changes. He always does, to be honest, it never draws a game party. Yeah, there was no attempt to just lose it by one goal and take the thing that he really went to time with it. And I thought it was, it was really good that we were going to take the most light in school. But again, just to say going forward, they're so difficult to defend against. And Sahago, I'd be interested to know whether Sahago thinks about his new role as an impact substitute, but he just comes on fresh and he just, it just, it just puts so much doubt into him. That's an Norwich as well, because Norwich is sort of holding on against us. We were the better team, but some of these Sahago comes on, he could see them as a real problem to deal with. And it's because they were sort of double teaming him that Panchu found out a little bit space to get behind this goal. And Panchu does that to get the best out of Will sometimes, when we drop him, it just sort of gives him a kick out the backside a bit. It was no point in two on a second, yes, why Panchu does anything, basically. I don't know whether it's because Sahago's carrying a knock or whether he simply wants to try other options, or again, it's because of what we spoke about earlier on that we have other players available, so he doesn't need to play Will from the start. Which, and I think that's another important thing and the improvement is that apart from the calf, they're all available and it's giving us options, and it's much better to be able to decide to make changes than have to make them. And it's quite clear, we've said this again all through the season, it's quite clear that our first 11 is a good team, it's just the squad that's there. How do you feel, Trevor, it's about the half-time subs, because, yes, Panchu is confident after making a step at half-time, if he keeps making half-time subs, is that an admission of failure in the first half? No, he has to be, really, doesn't he? If everything's going well, he's not going to make changes then. Well, it's not necessarily a failure, is it? It's more of a thing, like we said, he's an attacking manager, he wants to win games, he even wins them or loses them, you very rarely draw a game on the bar, do you? Well, recently we've had a couple of joys ironically, but when he brings people on at half-time, it's always because he has that - he always has the - well, you guys, it's hard to think about it, I don't think it's a failure, it's more of him. He's just a confident manager and he thinks he knows best, and he'll bring someone at half-time with a vision, and he's done it a couple of times, that has worked. Panchu coming at half-time, early on in the season, has done its job, and changing the wings around half-time, it does do a job because it throws teams off, because I think with us as a team, we're quite predictable, well, every team is kind of predictable, you have your game plan, but we're a team that attacks down the wings, and if you play a whole half with two wings and then switch it up at half-time, we'll switch up one part, it can throw a team completely, and that might be the game plan sometimes. Sometimes it might be a thing that we play him who's not as fast as suddenly, bring on the per-way pace, it's thrown them completely, or suddenly bring on Panchu, who is going to be a bit more attacking, and then take off, you know, leadly, who's somebody who holds, and suddenly they're dealing with four attacking players instead of just three, and it's mental games as well. Travis has put his finger on it with the words 'game plan' because I think if you would say to Panchu, is that an admission of failure, it'd be horrifying, because I think what he would say is that the plan is you go away to places at West End of Arsenal, you set up in a particular way to get to the 60-minute mark in the game, hopefully, Neil, Neil, or maybe just actually a lead, and then you change it up and you bring on the players that you spend an hour wearing them down basically, and then you bring the offensive players on to change the shape of the game and to nick the goal that you need. And I think he's what he would say. But if you're doing it a half time, it's that... No, I suspect giving the benefit of the doubt and put a positive spin on it, and say that's what he was always going to do and saying what it's worked, isn't it? Has it worked against West Ham, worked against Norwich, worked against Arsenal? Well maybe we'd have to look at if a failure would probably be coming to half-time and not having anything to do, not being able to make any changes, the fact that he's managed to bring people on at half-time and change games, that's kind of going to have failure at all. Well also... Be positive you've come in with more than one idea. And let's be fair, and it hurts back to something we've already mentioned several times. He's got better players to leave on the bench now, because in the past, the players on the bench are game-changers, League, I'd love him, I know the goal is dope, but we haven't had players that you can go, I'll cry at great, he's on the beat, Fraser Campbell's like, you don't, but when you look at the bench, when you can afford to leave people out to the heart, second, on the bench that you can bring on punch and you're talking about bringing good players on that can change the way you play, you can inject pace and inject skill and that's where, as well as saying, Norwich must have been looking at the Palace bench and halfway through the game, so I think that's more to do with the fact that people are back, thick again, even... Punching has been really good since, he's back. Yeah, even if you've got, even if you're resting combined, he's on the bench, they're going to be looking over game team, they've got Kabbata, come on, they've got McArthur to come on, so it's, it's, and that's what we need, that's the big thing that we need to do next season, is make sure that every player that comes on, is either as good as the person who replaced nor is the game-changer is bad, so... Yeah, it's not just literally rushing. And how do you just look at it and go, look, I've had my squad back and in the past four games we've, we've got six points, after two points in 12, we've got six in four and, and we've locked, I know we've locked Nervie against Norwich and there are times against ever, but we play the right against Nervie. It's a barrier, never to the Norwich. Yeah, so we've looked more like the Palace of Old, and again it's that, it's the opposite of a vicious circle, it just breeds confidence in it, and the fact is we go to, go to Old Trafford tomorrow, not, you know, not panicking, not necessarily, again, at any point would be a bonus, but if United play as lamely as they did against Villar, and they've got a semi-final on Saturday, and I would argue that, yeah, often Palace fans would be disappointed if they don't get to the final, but that's it, ever to the man you've found, possibly for both clubs, both managed his jobs are on the line, I think, and I think man United will be more cautious than us in anything tomorrow night in terms of, it'll be really interesting to see what team Van Halpe is, so I don't think we need to go... You'd be interested in the way the game is played, don't you? Yeah, it will be, yeah, I mean you would expect some fairly limited draw, but if this game had been four or five weeks ago, you'd write it off or no, you don't, because we're going up there in a completely different frame of mind. Can I impart one with the question to you, Chaps, which is... You just did. I did, yeah, you're right, and another question, are we safe? You seriously expected me to answer that out loud after the stick I've been getting since January when I had the similarities to suggest that our 21-point cushion or whatever it was, might be good enough. It's safer, and I think it's really interesting, the book is the people you look at, and it's interesting that even, there was a slight element on Saturday night of trying to inject a bit of attention into it, by including us in the graphic, the relegation, which the point of Arsenal ruined a little bit, because no one even bothers the show, I'm not going to say we're safe, but it looks increasingly like it's two out of those... Yeah, well the statisticians give us an 0.1% chance or something crazy on them going down, so... Yeah, and it would... But as you said, those of us who are old enough to remember, hold a lap of honor. Yeah, I've heard about it numerous times. The thing is, I said, I think three weeks ago, I said before the West Ham game, I said I could see it's not winning another game, but three points would probably do it, and we've got six points since then, and the way we're playing, you'd be amazed if we didn't pick up another point or two along the way, and that's going to be enough, and it just relies on... It's not like you're looking at one team below us, it's got a brilliant run, you're looking at two teams, we've got to win more games than they've won all season. That defeat by Sunderland will have knocked the stuffing out of Norwich. I mean, the Manchester City Newcastle game would have just kicked off, but if Newcastle beat Manchester, Liverpool fair play to them, but I'm guessing that by Saturday afternoon, Newcastle won't be out of catches, so that'll be a lot of the way away. So we could be absolutely fine without even playing on the league game? Well, some of them kick off. Sunderland's game finishes just before the semi-final starts, and if they don't win that, then they've got to win all their games by, so by the time the kick off comes, we could be in the situation of approaching... I mean, we could just enjoy Sunday. No, it's going to be a joy Sunday, geez, it's not going to be too late. But no, I'm not going to lie, there was a time a couple of weeks ago when I was starting to get not anxious, but I started to think that it panes to do that a bit. You know, I broke down all the fixtures, and my potential of what could happen and all that's what sort of teenager I am, but that crumpled piece of paper in my pocket looks more encouraging. It's still any pocket, though. Yeah, it's still... Oh, of course, it's going to be my pocket until probably as a memento forever, but the fact is, as well, when we do look back at the end of the season ago, we did have a panic. We shouldn't overlook that we should never have come to this. Yeah. And whatever happens, it's a spectacular fall from grace. Okay, well, we're going to have a spectacular not fall from grace. Oh, not your best, there's one. No, no, no, no. Because we're going to hit into part two, there's a bell for part two right there. And we're going to have questions from our listeners, so join us in a bit. Hello, and welcome back to the five-year plan podcast. Hi. Hi. Pods by 177, sponsored by Vector Printing for all your printing and body needs, go to vector.co.uk. And it's next to other. Okay. And JCIS, the Global Research and Brand Consultancy from South London, visit JC-IS.com. I will. Very good. And we've been joining part two here by Andy Street. Oh, hello. Hello. Hey, how are you? Oh, okay, thank you. I'm swarming in here, late. Why are you late? Charlie Big potatoes. There's a privacy injunction against me for the first part, and it's now been lifted. Taken out by an unknown goalkeeper, initials WH, because I don't know if that's fine. Okay, good. Well, we're, we're glad you're here. You did miss actually in the first part, the opportunity to, we were all praising Wayne Hennessy for his performance. WH. WH was performances, so you... They much better than last two games, doesn't they? Yeah. That means a lot coming from you. Yeah, it does, yeah. Okay. Shall we get lifted? Shall we... Does, now tell everybody what you said just before we started recording. You said that even I can spread myself out. That's all these, he's good at star jumping in. You need to contextualize that. You need to contextualize that. Star jumping in. No, I just said that he is fortunate in some ways and that the last team matches he's not going to move his feet too much. Everything went straight out of him, you said. I just gave him a reserve price. You've mainly put him in the caveats, but he was lucky to everything was straight out. Okay. Right. We got lots of questions from our listeners. The first question comes from Michael Prendegast. I'm Michael. He says, "Was it a mistake not to start carrying Benzie Marigans to Arsenal?" Did you guys see that? The... Alice tweeted the team out and by mistake they put on the bench Benziema. What? Really? Yeah. Let's see the what? I mean, how... Instead of Zaha, I think it was. Oh, I see. I don't know quite how that happens. Yeah. I just have like some aggressive autocorrect. Zaha, I'm not a Zaha or my iPhone. It's changed to Benziema before. It's never happened. Well, there you go. Zero is as well as they were trying to keep that move under wraps. Yeah. It's very long to start. To the middle of the press conference starting. Well, yeah. What way to announce it? I don't really rate him anyway. He's no Fraser Campbell as he tries. Yeah, yeah. No, I wouldn't have him. Yeah. So I would tell him where to go. Okay. The next question is from Sam Harris 4896. Hi, Sam. 4896. He says... I just know his prisoner number is it? I don't know what that is. Does the panel think that Jules will ever play in Red and Blue again? He might play in Green. Do you know what? I suspect the answer to that is probably no. No, he's had his testimonial. I think it's intriguing that he signed an years extension to his contract. Yeah. But I suspect everything you hear from within the club indicates that part of you literally thinks it's a question of him being too small. And we've only missed this conversation probably luckily that we talked about the fact that Hennessy, we wouldn't be surprised if he's our first to us goalkeeper in the next season. But I don't think Jules will be even a regular back up to be perfectly honest. So... As long as Pargy's there, it's not going to happen, I don't think. No. There'll be somebody I would see might come in, but it's been obvious that he's not a fan. No, it's a shame. Yeah. Oh, it's a great shame. I think the writing was on the wall when he didn't start the Liverpool game, even though he'd been on the bench. All right. I was thinking that he's only nine games off being our most appeared ever goalkeeper. I don't know, I wouldn't be surprised, but Pargy's not a sort of player in nine games, just a sense of mentality. But you'd be... But I haven't said that. I'm still... This fact that he's extended his contract by a year is an interesting one. Or that they'd be keeping around as a coach or a solid mistake. Possibly, yeah. No, you can never see what happens behind the scenes. Yeah, but he's... Well, with a finite meeting, isn't it? Yeah. He's clearly third choice goalkeeper, so deal with it by the fans. Basically, well, that is... Yeah. Okay. The next question is from Tweeting Nav. Hi. Hi. Hi, Tweeting. He says, "If you could pick one player other than Martin from the 1990s semi-final team to play on Sunday, who would it be?" From the semi-final team. From the semi-final team. The semi-final team. No, it can't be right. It can't be right. Right, there's someone in the final that it'd be right if he was yet available. Yeah. I would say bright, but I'm just going to not do that to piss him off with you, but if you find out about this... Yeah, he'd be... He's being added enough. Yeah. Well, yeah. It's interesting that there's... Oh, I suppose we would. Yeah. No, I just might. We're probably getting in there in this post. So it's one of those difficult questions. It's so hard to compare players, because even writing now would probably struggle. Well, I suppose Jamie Vardy's similar sort of player to writing coming from out of nowhere and having that energy. It's an interesting question, but it's... We did. We haven't set them back. Actually, we did, because we had more players from 1990 than we thought in the year, didn't we? Yeah. We had more possibly than we have from 2050. I think we did. Yeah. One of the ones on the pod shouted me down when I said that... Yeah, yeah, yeah. One of them thought we were far back, technically, physically and athletically. No, I agree with you. No, yeah, but I think we just got more nostalgic as the pod went on. Yeah, it did. And so more crept in. Yeah, I'd say pagedy. I'm going to go pagedy. Oh, OK. Just tuned about. Well, also, because we know that he's called us the winner anyway, so... Yeah. ...we'll know what happened. I don't think that's how time travel works. The next question... ...the next question. The first episode of Dot Two, rather than the first one. That's good. That's good. Right. The next question is from Chris Brown. Hi, Chris. He says, "Who are your five penalty takers? Should the semi go to that?" Well, it depends on the picture. It does. That's true. That's very true. Well, goodbye would be one. Yeah. Wicom would be another. Yeah. If Gail was on, I'd stick him in there. Gail. Do you know what they are if he's on? They're the boil. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Attack in players? I don't think I'd stick. Would you stick will for... Oh, do you think that would take him? Do you think that would take him? If he was still there? I'd take... I'd pick Suarez, because he'd never know whether he'd clear the stadium room. That's true. Or be one of the greatest penalties that's ever been taken. Yeah, he'd certainly confuse the keeper. It would. Yeah. So I'll go then. Yeah, but let's not even consider the idea of it going to penalties. No, I'd set up behind first at the clock. That's like a lot of trouble. OK. A lot of our questions are FA Cup themed, as you would expect for this week. But we are going to be doing an extra podcast, which we release towards the end of the week, focusing on that, because obviously there was a game before that, which is May 90. If we will touch on at the end of this pod. And the next question is from Wayne Hart Lovelace. Oh, hi. Wayne. He says, "If we win the FA Cup, or actually win the FA Cup, are any of these themed panels that's us going to get a tattoo?" Ah, I've already cleared this with Mrs. Day. I am. But let's not. Let's none of us make rest promises, because we still haven't got the one we haven't. If we win the FA Cup, I will get a tattoo of the FA Cup. What? OK. We made it. I made it right from it. No, my face. Just might be a bit career limited for me. Oh, hi. How are you doing today, Mrs. Joy? Well, have you got tattoo of the FA Cup on your face? No. I'll get a tattoo. I'm scared. I don't know. No. I'm not going to be with every coach. Yeah. You just told him, "Spard is where we're going to FA Cup tattoo with on your face." For the last time we made a tattoo-related bold prediction was if Palace stay up, that's our season. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that worked. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We still haven't got a tattoo. You know, rest of my fate has kind of learned off that one, given that we made FA Cup promises to it that if something happened, that we do something that didn't. I'm going to get a tattoo. You guys have made a FA Cup promise before. Unless we get a tattoo between now and Sunday. I'd pretty much promise myself years ago that if Palace won anything, I would get a tattoo to get a tattoo. Okay. It's a good, it's a good promise. Yeah. Maybe we should, maybe we should do that. Well, you're not going to anyway. Well, I will. You can't get a bit of pay. Well, yeah, they're in sponsor's name. Oh, yeah. Do you think to do tattoos? I don't think so. Okay. No. We can ask them though. Okay. Next question is from David Fraser. Hi, David. He says, "If our season's form had been the other way round, i.e. poor start, stronger finish, would Palace fans be happier now?" Well, it has been two seasons before this, isn't it really? Mm-hmm. We've managed to do what we did at the beginning of the season at the end of the season. I don't know. If we weren't, if we weren't, we are now. It's a good question. I mean, because, arguably, if this run a form would have been at the start of the season, we would have sacked the manager. Wow. And when the season's over, the fact that we're still in the Premier League is poor. When we discuss this right at the start of the season that, you know, we're still at that Premier League career, we're staying in the Premier League, it's the first priority. And whatever happens to be now in the end of the season, if we've stayed in the Premier League, then you will go, "Yeah, that's a good, that's a good season." But yes, of course it always looks better when you're in real trouble at Christmas and someone comes in in terms of fortunes round. You would be much more upbeat as we are simply off the back of three draws on the win in the last four games. And if we go into whatever happens at Wembley, if we go into the start of the next season, having won a couple more games this season, they're also going to be. Because the fact is, we could still, the Premier League has been so poor this season that a club, a club who's only, who drew two out of 14 games, could be 12th tomorrow. Exactly. And that's, we should be ludicrous. I mean, that's why I bet the fans made someone with salt set last week that we could have gone above them after the terrible run. Well, there's a possibility in the season that if you were, we were able to just turn it on and win three of our four games. And we could end up being 12th for 11th this season. This could end up at best season ever. We could be not that far off last season's points total. Do you think if we end up, if we do end up 12th or 13th and get to the Cup final, will this season be seen as a success or a memorable one? No, no. Oh, memorable. Certainly possible. But we talked earlier on, in fact, at the end of the last part, whatever happens, you can't ignore what happened between January and beginning of April. It's too long and too consistent to run a bad form. For all that, as I said, for all the excuses you make, you can't ignore what happened. You simply can't. And you can't, you can't just go, "Well, brilliant, we finished 12th, what a good season." You just have to look at what happened, why it happened, and make sure that never happens again. Because we shouldn't be in a situation where we're looking at the Newcastle result tonight. Even Albeit, semi-jokingly, just shouldn't have happened. So, we all know what needs to happen in the close season. We simply have to improve the squad. David added on some information about points. After 34 games, which is what we played this season, last season, we were 12th at 42 points. Had we been on 39, not we are now, we still would have been 12th. So, we're really not that far away. We're not far away. And that's the odd thing is that from around February, we've not, we've always been almost completely matching the points total from last season. So, we've never been that far off. It's just that, as is the nature of football fans, you're judging by what happened before Christmas, rather than what happened in the past two seasons. And why wouldn't you? We all thought that we'd pass some sort of milestone and become a much better club. And we haven't used Andy's favourite phrase for quite some weeks, but we'd refer it to the me. Maybe that's why. Maybe that's why. But we weren't comparing light for light. So, I'm still in the regeneration effect, staying in the Premier League is a good result. I mean, I suppose a good thing is that at least in gender a little bit more realism amongst a lot of people. In the last two seasons, when the bad runs occurred, everyone, if they wanted to take a slightly sort of revisionist approach could look back at them and go. Well, it was all the fault of the two useless managers we had at the time. It was all either hotter ways for them. It was all war knocks fault. Once we got rid of them, the brilliant squad started performing at the level that it was capable of and should have done in the first place. And the only problem was the manager. And this year, it's kind of showing that, you know, fluctuations in performance can come down to more than just the manager, because the manager was in charge in August. It would be in charge up to the point at which that good run took us to that end over performance. And you've been the manager since we've had the sort of tie-off at the other end. So, I suppose at least it just demonstrates that, you know, that squad still needs work. And it's not the finished article. In finishing. You're going to have sort of ups and downs in every season around that sort of era of the table. I suppose at least it, you know, reinforces both amongst fans. But also amongst the club. Because I think, you know, there's a danger if you finish the season. I did last season. You really do rest on your knowledge a little bit. Because you say, well, look, we're doing okay. All we need to do is add a French garnish to this dish. And we're a complete puppet. You know, realistically, if we talk about reality chips, 12, 14th is probably where we are as a club in the Premier League. Oh, that's what I've always said. And that's much better than we have been in the past. You only have to look at Eddie Boyle's comments today. What he said that winning the affect with Palace would be his biggest achievement. Because he said, we're not playing, and it's, you know, probably say his misquoted. He said, we're not playing brilliant football. But that's not surprising with the players we've got. He was comparing us to the teams he's played for before. Which actually meant that he around Madrid. Bit of a difference. But clearly, that's an indication that we've got to play that Eddie Boyle, who is happy to admit that we're the smallest club he's ever played for with the most limited squad. And that this would be getting to where he would be a massive achievement. And in the cold light of day, finishing 12th, it's great for us. Well, that's why we're in that performance at the Emirates. And I'm sure you've gone through it in some depth in part one that I missed. But it was kind of striking that a lot of the criticism amongst Palace fans wasn't for the performance of the ball. It was for the performance once they got a limited amount of possession. But if you're playing players like Joe Ledley and like me and Ajette Night Week out and giving them very little of the ball and expecting them to do great things with it, it's going to be difficult. So, you know, it is a limited squad. And we have to be realistic about that. OK, the next question is from Johnny Latimer. Hi, Johnny. Johnny says, "Do you think given the impact he's had off the bench recently," which would have been in part one, "would Will be better used off the bench at Wembley?" Well, I'd be interested. I mean, we did cover this in some detail. So I'd be interested in what Eddie thinks about it. He has been effective. But having said that, when we have that Leansville, he was one of the only people that was playing consistently well from the start. So, Andy, what do you reckon? Well, I suppose you got to be careful when you think about that, because yes, he was affected off the bench. But then you have to think about things in terms of what could have happened that didn't happen. I would have still been affected how he started. Was he playing in such a way that it indicates that the only way in which he would have been affected would have been to come off the bench? I'm not sure that's necessarily the case. But he's played well enough that I don't think he was worthy of being dropped in the manner that he was dropped off for one bad half at West Ham. I thought it was incredibly harsh to drop him for those last two matches. And yes, he performed well coming on against Norwich and coming on against Arsenal. But to me, you start your best players and you start someone who is able to make things happen in his mobile like Wilfred Zarhart above Sacco. Yeah, it's great that he can come on and stretch a game in the last 15 minutes, if need be. But what if Arsenal had taken two or three of the chances that he did present themselves to them? What if Norwich in the 60 minutes in which we were fairly mediocre at Salah's part had managed to put away one or two of the half chance they'd had? It then makes it a completely moot point and you kind of hamstring yourself by making sure that your best asset isn't available from the start to stretch a defence. I mean, if you've got such a wealth of talent that Zarhart isn't, you know, by far and away in the top five players that you've got, then yeah, maybe you can afford to have that luxury to bring him off the bench to stretch a game late on. But we're just not in that place yet. And so to me, I would be starting him at Watford in the same way that I'd be starting him if fit every match. It might be, of course, that he's masking his fitness in mind because he's still young and it might be that, yeah, he was one of those players who played pretty much every game during the bad spell. I mean, he just feels that he's not strong enough or fit enough to do a whole 90 minutes and he's better as an impact player. But, yeah, I mean, Andy, for everything that we said in the first part, Andy's right, he would, we're not at a stage yet or we can't afford to start every game without our best players, but Pardee will say, well, it's worked, isn't it? Yeah, exactly. So that's, you know... And it worked on Sunday? Because that's what we were saying earlier in the first part, Andy. Pardee would probably say that the plan is to make sure we're still in games and then brings a heart on to, you know, rectify the one goal behind or get sort of the ultimate goal. Which I'm not even hearing, but the problem is that I don't think we're quite at that level of sort of defensive attitude, where you're not grinding you luck heavily for that to be able to happen and you saw that against Arsenal. Now, we did limit them to a certain extent to very few really clear-cut chances, but there were still some really clear-cut chances. Yeah. So... I've never argued as well, and Travis mentioned this in the first part. Zaha hasn't been doing the defensive legwork as well as he has been in the past. So that might be another consideration. Yeah. Yeah. It's good though, because obviously Zaha left us a couple of years ago, so it is good that he's back at us, and we are getting probably some of the best football we've seen from Wilf in his career, and he's with us, full-time player, and developing hopefully into the player that we want to see. So that's, you know... Well, the player at the Wilf, we want to see, is that Wilf in the last minute, but that's some Wilf up. Fantastic. He used all his strength and pace and power to make that lung-busting run down the right edge. And not making the past. And then Wilf as well. And then that's it. It's summed him up entirely, and then chose the wrong option when Adi by all was split. Probably just as well, because hand-added by all was split at last. Certainly, yeah. The whole of North London would have self-combusted. Yeah. But having said that, but it was a real, it was just a portrait of Zaha'a, his best, and then ultimately, it's not so straight. But I think, certainly, as the season's progressed, he's looking more and more like the player we thought he was going to be. Yeah, it'd definitely be in progress. Yeah, I would have vowed that. I definitely think him being dropped recently is a lot to do with his own mental game, because I remember when I was at the club before, and it was when he was there before he went off to Man United. I spoke to a couple of the academy managers who had obviously had him a few years previous, and they just, I was speaking to Sean Derry once I went to the trainer, and he's a very smart guy. And they just said, "Look, Wilf's one of those guys who's like, "you're kind of sitting down in a chain." You go, "Look, Wilf." They gave him a, they took his phone at training sessions, put a video on there of all these things he did good and bad in the last game. You just sit him down and focus him like that. So I think Pargy, sometimes, he's almost like training a dog. You have to do the very basic things. Yeah. You know, if you don't want them to take the food away or put the food there if you want them to go there, it's just like, drop him, and then he'll realise that sometimes just saying something to some players will just go, "Yeah, he'll play better next time, go for it." "Oh, no, wait, I'm dropped. I'll wait." I used to do some "get a bit of fire in my belly." Sometimes it's just the very basic, basic things, especially in players like Zaha, who aren't on the probably the same intelligence as your peer loads and your getting acts. And things are like, you know, people will just make it rainier, but it's just possible to play. I think the thing with Zaha, as well, is I think the last year is as good as he's ever going to be. Oh, yeah. And Zaha isn't. Yeah. Yeah. Which is why, as much as I love the last year, he's... It's still about three years, three, four years. Yeah. I mean, Zaha, I'd be much more upset at losing Zaha would be losing... No, but that's a bit of a late bloomer. They've always seen something about him. He's been a championship player up until he's about 25, really, wasn't he? Yeah. The next question is from Karl Mortimer. Hi, Karl. Hi, Karl. He says, "Do the panel want to see Brighton go up?" Or, "Do we want to see them fail again?" I always think the best place for your local rivals is one division below you. I agree. Frankly, but I had a massive argument with the Palace fan the other day who said, "No, you've got to be in our division." So the world can see us beating them, homing away. But I would much rather, and Brighton fans, listen to this. There's no real malice involved in this. I just want them to get a real taste of going up and then cock it up. Are there anybody in front of this thing to this? I'd be surprised if they hadn't realized their mistake by now. Realistically, I wouldn't want them to come up. But, you know, if I go to bed and have a nice, nice dream, it will be coming up and going down with less than Derby. Yeah. That's the dream for me. Coming up and going down with less than Derby. It's always that worry. Being in the proper place is going to be my belief. In my diploma, 1st of 12, when I got money. They have got money. And all the time, they're in the Premier League. There's always that chance that they will beat us. It's always much better. You just feel better in yourself to be a division above them. Two divisions above Millwood and Charlton. Which is how it should be. The natural order of things has taken several decades. But the natural order has been restored. And the big proper club are in the big proper division. And the other, no, while they're in various leagues. I'm going to have to disagree with Kevin here. I think it's completely wrong that you're right. We should be one division player. They should be at least four. I'd be happy to be a player. Team sponsored by Vadirama. Like that lay down in the pyramid. But these playoffs coming up, I'd like them to miss out. Preferably by gold difference on automatic promotion. The gold score, gold difference. It did gold. I won the prime dean style scenario. And the last five minutes of the full calendar. And then I want them to lose in the semi finals game so they don't even get a Wembley trip. Yeah. I think we'd all be happy with that. Okay, let's question some Kevin Childs. He says, "Who's getting to the pub earliest for the semi on Sunday?" He's going for 10.30 a.m. We know what happened at the playoffs when a group of middle-aged men decided to be in the pub at half eight. Which one? The one by Baker Street Station, which is the one with the inflatable cul-verits. Well, I'm not going to the pub on Sunday because a lot of people supporting a marathon run up. Because we've got the marathon only on Sunday, so it could be a lot of palace fans who think you're either going to miss out on the match or not go as straight as you're carrying on running here. Carry on running. It's a good luck to all of them. Absolutely. I've got a much worse reason for not getting too drunk before. Because I've got a path to afterwards. Oh, God. You're the worst. Well, at the moment, I might have to get the semi-final in my dinner jacket in a hotel. That would be incredible. If we get to penalties, I won't be there to see them unfortunately. Let's hope we don't get to penalties. But I'd quite like to actually have some actual memories of the game at Wembley this time rather than having to watch the highlights over and over again. I'd have to play offs to remind me what happened. Although, I was fine at the game. It was just afterwards when... Yeah, it was interesting. You want to put money on a Watford penalty, being as easy as well. Because they've conceded penalties all over the place. Two in the last match. Yeah. They're both safe in there. So, yeah. It's like an institute for thousands of hours, so I'll predict in them, they're going to give away at least one penalty. It's like the old days, won't it? Wasn't it? Didn't you become the first keeper ever to save two against one player in one game? Did it? I think, well, maybe not known that. Something like that. Okay. I don't know. We'll go with that. Don't quote me on you. Okay. Right. That's the end of part two. Thank you very much for your questions. In part three, we're going to look forward to that mid-week game against Man United. Briefly. So, Jon, it's in a bit. Thank you, Jon, it's in a bit. Welcome back to this week's five-year plan podcast. Hey. What's going on? 7T7 sponsored by Vector Printing for your printing boarder you need. Go to Vectorflow code UK and Vectorflow. Hey. JCO, yes. There's going to be full research in France and so on. See if I'm from south London. Visit JCO-IS.com. I will. But forget you can rate us on iTunes and we will climb the pod table, much like Palace are doing right now. So, go on to iTunes, give us a five-star rating, and give us a nice comment. And we will love you forever. Right. We're going to briefly preview. We're not going to be. We won't love you enough to have a tattoo of your name done, right? No, but we... It's based on name you got. If your name's like Lombard, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. We might. We might do that. We won't. So, we're not going to preview the semi-final because we're going to do an extra, extra pod and a few days time to do that. But we are going to briefly preview the menu game. Which is Wednesday night, away at menu. We've got a couple of questions for that. So, I've saved one of the questions for part three. And it comes from... I don't think this is a person's real name. Zulu, Zulu echo Romeo Oscar. That's zero. That's zero. That's not called zero. And has said... Hi, Zulu. Hi, zero. Should we feel that we can team against menu time to blood a few development team players? I think they're all out on loan anyway. We're going to feel that we can team because of this mysterious rash of injuries we've got. Yeah, is it the right decision? It might not have been three weeks ago, but... It's never the best of atmospheres at Old Trafford anyway. And you imagine tomorrow night the atmosphere is going to be non-existent because... When are they? I'll be amazed... I'll be amazed if, you know, it didn't rest players. I'm sure they will start a really, but they'll rest other players. Because, like we said before, that Van Hal's job pretty much rests on him getting to Wembley with the FA Cup. I think we're going to play every game at Old Trafford this season. Yeah, I think he won't. Because he's one goal of 100. Yeah. At Old Trafford, the only player to score over 100 goals at one stadium is Omri, 114 at Ivory. Very good. It's a very nice one. Yeah. That would start raining. I think whatever happens tomorrow night, it's not going to be a game full of blood and thunder and rest tackles. Is it a thing? It sort of feels a bit of a game that I think everyone would just kind of want to get out of the way. But I'm just interested to see what the back floor is going to be. Yeah. If Ward and Dan have both got mysterious knocks. Maybe your friend, Martin Kelly, might get... Mary Appen was a hedge. I was thinking Mary Appen. He'll put Hangerland. I don't know if he'll put Kelly in the centre back. He'll put Kelly in a... Right back. Right back in Hangerland that sent her back, I would imagine. Just as long as it's not as tedious as the match of the Emirates. I'd like to see him. It will be. I'm just hanging with the players at Rushford. I did. But again, it's one of those players you wouldn't expect to start at Rushford. I think the FA Cup has become their priority. And they play football basically. Do you remember that episode of The Simpsons where they did what football is like? Yeah, yeah. They pass it around the defence for ten minutes at a time. And that's basically Mary Knight this season. So it's not going to be the most enthralling of matches. And they really struggle against Villa who are arguably one of the poorest Premier League sides in history. So it'd be interesting to see what the team is and for all the party talks about momentum, et cetera. I'd imagine that if I all would start tomorrow night. Yeah, I'd think it would. I would guess. Does it feel a bit more like if we can come through this game? Maybe get a point, that'd be great and that would almost certainly be safe. But if we come through and we haven't really had any injuries to any big players, that's kind of maybe a bit more important. Whatever happens, we all looked at the fixture. Even a few weeks ago, before we got the point West Ham, we looked at the fixture list and he went, "Let's get past Mary Knight and Arsenal." And then we've got Stokes, Newcastle, Southampton. We all think we can get points from those games. The way we're playing, you wouldn't be surprised if we got a point in the main. But again, I still think it would be a bonus point. And it is one of those, let's get it out of the way and then we'll see what happens in the last three games. And the fact that we've got six points at the last four games makes it a lot more comfortable. Of course it does. And the fact is that anything there tomorrow night would pretty much put the seat on it. But I think Travis is right. I don't think we should be worried about going up there. Does it feel a bit like the fear factor has kind of gone from teams like Manu, and arguably all this sort of kind of traditional top four teams, that now anyone, even Palace now, with a semi-final to come, we can still go there Andy and still feel fairly confident of getting a result. It's not the same as going to old traffic in the 90s, doesn't it? I think just every team in the Premier League generally is so well conditioned. Physically, and in terms of their endurance, there was all that sort of stuff that they can match these teams generally for all the physical aspects of the game. And then the only thing that they're having to deal with is the fact that these guys are probably going to have slightly smarter runs off the ball, slightly better first touch, slightly better, you know. But it's just a delivery of their ball, but they're not going to outrun anyone anymore. They're not going to out-fight anyone anymore. And they're not going to be able to out-muscle anyone. Because of that, I think there is a certain element that teams from probably 17th all the way up to the lower echelon of the top half aren't scared of anyone. Well, I've always been more confident as a Palace fan going to play Man You Know It than I do. I always, and you always play a bit of football. You always end up losing one nil. And I do think we are on a point against Man You Know It this season because we definitely dropped to it home. We should have definitely won that game. The thing is, as well, the Leicester have shown that you can go anywhere and play without fear. But also, since Ferguson went, old traffic is not the same anyway. You don't have that fear that referees are scared of Ferguson. The crowd, the atmosphere has just completely gone. So they're not a 12th man anymore. And they get, in fact, they get on the team quite quickly if they're not doing well. Van Hal is not popular. You know, Rashford has kind of covered over the paper over a lot of cracks. And Van Hal to his credit has played kids, which is something we should look at. I'd expect him to start with a few tomorrow night, but do you know what? It's one of those games where you'd think, you know, part of Van Hal to just shake hands before the game and say they will do it for both of us, won't it? Yeah. And let's not get anyone sent off or injured. So you'd expect to kind of imagine a kind of testimonial feel to it almost. That's right. Even if we don't get drunk, there will still be people chanting, "Olden" in the corner. No, we're getting back and forth. Yeah, me. Okay, cos I wasn't going to do in this day, because we'd run out of time. But I forgot that I did actually prep a couple of really good ones. So can I round off this board by doing a couple of in this days, on this day, in this week? Whatever we call it. Yeah, I wouldn't have explained that to people really, I would have just said we're going to end with. What are the listed in the loop of what's going on? Okay, on this day in 2014, what did Palace do? What was it? So in 19th of April, 2014, what did Palace do? Did we secure safety against West Ham? We did, indeed. Yeah. So there you go. So it may well be tomorrow night, could well be... Was that with the nil, nil, draw? One-nil win in West Ham. Oh, one-nil win, the one-nil win? Yeah, it wasn't. Yeah, it wasn't. It also wasn't because I remember the players lining up. And there's that great photo of them. Yes, there's a photo of them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that'd be nice, wouldn't it? No, let's put money on a ginnet penalty tomorrow, aren't there? Well, there you go. And also, on this day, in 1969, what did Palace do? We got promoted to the first division for the first time. Big Dave had had it full on 3-2. Correct. After being 2-nil down at half time. Right, it's Palace way of doing things. Yeah. Yeah. Although it wasn't the last game of the season, we still had another game. That was the game. Yeah, but that was the way the game sealed it. Yeah. So it turns out April 19th is a big day in Palace's history. April 19th today, isn't it? Just a bit of shame plans. Just a bit of shame plans. We're not on the 20th, yeah, yeah. It's brilliant, isn't it? If they would only have the game forward. Turn 24 hours. But if you go in 10 minutes, nightish. But it's in this week, isn't it? If you do a bit of research, you'll find out we've been relegated three times on the 20th. Well, just in case. It's this week. You're right, absolutely. This is a good week. It's a big week for Palace, right? It's a good week. We've won twice in 110 years. We've won games. Yes. So we've got 180 against two. I just think those are two big games in Palace's history, and they happen this week. Two of the bigger games in our history, yes. Who would have thought that the bigger moments would come towards the end of the season? It might have been April. It might. And they're back in December. We will start with Rubens and killing Go visit in the cup shop. I have for one. I'm absolutely amazed. Yeah. Well, they may have visited the cup shop in April as well. We'll never know. I'm just trying to make us feel a little bit more positive about the big games. No, no, no, you're right. They're great anniversaries. There you go. And I think that is a positive note to end this week's pod on. So thank you very much for listening. There will be an FYP pod extra in a few days time to preview, specifically preview that FA Cup semi-final. But until then, thank you very much for listening. Kevin, Travis, Andy, when you did turn up. Thanks for being here. That's right. Thank you. And listeners, you'll hear from us soon. So goodbye. It's time to get your checking account to zero with free checking from PenFed. That's zero ATM fees, zero balance requirements, and zero time spent waiting for your paycheck to direct deposit because you can receive it up to two days early. Open your account with just $25 and see how big zero can be. Apply online today at penfed.org/freechecking. Early direct deposit eligibility may vary between pay periods and timing of payers funding. To receive any advertised product, you must become a member of PenFed, insured by NCUA. This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network. [APPLAUSE]
Another busy week for Palace with two games in four days and another busy week for the FYP Podcast team as they look back over both those matches; draws with Everton and Arsenal. They also look ahead as Palace travel to Manchester United before that massive FA Cup semi-final with Watford. A special FYP Pod 177 extra will be released later in the week previewing that game at Wembley but for now join Jim, Kevin, Andy and Travis as they wrap up those two draws and ask, tentatively...are Palace actually safe from relegation now?
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