Glasner hails 'amazing' reaction & fans, plus Muñoz update
Oliver Glasner hailed Crystal Palace’s stunning first-half reaction to the double disappointment of a disallowed goal and then Tottenham’s opener.
The Eagles roared back from the narrowest of offside calls against Ismaïla Sarr and a Dominic Solanke tap-in to smash three goals past Tottenham in the space of 12 first-half minutes – Sarr striking twice and Jørgen Strand Larsen also netting – with the hosts also reduced to 10 men in the process.
That gave Palace enough comfort to see through the second-half without adding to their score, and Glasner told Palace TV: “I'm very pleased with the result, especially with the first-half performance, because it was mentally very difficult because we felt we took the lead.
“It was an amazing goal, disallowed, and two minutes later, with one poor defending after a set play, we were 1-0 down. We could see the crowd got a little bit of belief – and our reaction was amazing.
“We played forward with the penalty, their red card, and then straight before half-time scoring another two goals, which was really great.
“They were two amazing goals to be honest, with one player up. The first goal, everybody will see Adam [Wharton’s] pass and Jørgen's finish, but we lose the ball in the build-up at the edge of the box and the counter-press was great, especially Evann Guessand, the one who wins the ball back when they passed to their six.
“And because he makes a great movement to the ball and wins it back, Adam gets the ball, and then we know his quality with passing and Jørgen’s finishing quality.
“Of course, the second one was with Adam in the pocket and then with two or three touches and then finding this small gap. And Isma is always on his front foot making these runs, scoring goals and it was great to watch.”
On the second-half performance, the Manager added: “I think we could have done better in the second-half and had better control of the game. We gave them too many set plays, too many dangerous situations in our box.
“And we're talking about it – sometimes then we are losing our sharpness out of possession on second balls because they went straight, long, and they were sharp on second balls.
“That's how they got the game into our defensive third andgot too many dangerous situations. But at the end, it was a massive win today here at Tottenham.
“Now we are mid-table [13th] in the Premier League, and we are connected to the teams who were before us and it's positive.”
Glasner also provided an update on the injury to Daniel Muñoz, which saw the Colombian substituted off in the early stages of the first-half.
“It was his shoulder,” Glasner confirmed. “Right now, his arm is in a brace, we'll do further assessments.
"He says it doesn't feel so bad, but a shoulder [issue] is always tricky – hopefully not too long.
“We had to make a substitution after 15 minutes. Dani Muñoz had to leave and Nathaniel Clyne, he also didn't play for many games now, so it was a completely new back three [with Chadi Riad and Jaydee Canvot], five, but they did really well all together.”
We all appreciated the support from our fans
—Oliver Glasner
The Manager said of the travelling supporters, who enjoyed a memorable evening in North London: “We all appreciated the support from our fans. They were very loud today celebrating the team – and now we're now all looking forward to the rest of the season.”
Palace are without a game this weekend, our next match being at home to AEK Larnaca in the UEFA Conference League next Thursday (12th March, 20:00 GMT).
Glasner revealed: “Now, the players deserve a long weekend – I promised them one more day off if we won against [Zrinjski] Mostar, which we did, so they get a long weekend!
“Then we will start preparing, because Larnaca changed their whole sporting department – I heard their sporting director, their manager, have been sacked. They will have a game tomorrow, we will watch it and then prepare, of course, for the games against Larnaca and, in between, Leeds.
“But I think we all feel now more comfortable, more confident in the way we are playing. Things are getting clearer and clearer and this will be now until the end of the season to clarify things, especially for the new players, the way we want to attack, the way we want to defend. It's progress, week by week.”