Glasner: This was a team win, a club win
Oliver Glasner says Crystal Palace’s resilience in difficult moments – players, staff and supporters together – was key to booking a place in the FA Cup semi-finals at Wembley.
The Eagles were on the back foot for long stretches of both halves in the quarter-final win at Craven Cottage, but held their ground and – when opportunities arose – finished their chances clinically and emphatically to secure an unforgettable 3-0 win in West London.
“I'm very happy today,” Glasner told Palace TV. “It was just one [piece of the] puzzle of this group and of this club, together with the fans.
“Today, and everybody could feel it, we struggled heavily at the beginning. We were really rusty after having three weeks no games, for the first 15-20 minutes, but we always stayed together, the players on the pitch stayed together.
“With our fans we have a great connection. It's so important we always keep believing – we know that we will get our situations, we will get our moments, and this helps a lot, so for me it's a massive win today, and we are very happy about it.”
On Palace’s slower start to the game, Glasner observed: “I think the structure was really bad at the beginning. Some of us thought: ‘come on, what are we doing?’
“But when you don’t have many players for almost three weeks – and also before we didn't have a game together, and they have some different tasks to do in our game, it's just you have to change the mindset, and it's not so easy.
“We were really lucky. We lost at the beginning almost every single duel, we lost every single ball, and we were really high under pressure, but then we have to survive together, and never lose your belief.
“I think the first ‘hello’ was Jeff Lerma’s finish hitting the bar, and then of course Ebere Eze’s goal helped a lot to get this belief back, and then I think the structure was much better. We didn't allow them a lot, we defended so well all the set-plays, all the crosses, and waited for the decisive moment.
“I'm really pleased then with Daichi [Kamada] having the assist, and Eddie Nketiah scoring the decisive goal – they had a great impact from the bench – so I think this win is really when you're talking about a team win, about a club win, then it's a win today.”
Togetherness was a theme of the afternoon, with Palace’s defensive unit excelling in the face of adversity – and celebrating the win united in front of a raucous away support.
“They [the players] mention it so often,” Glasner confirmed. “Especially at the beginning of the season when we didn't get the results, I said I'm really confident because I know the character of every single player, and we knew we would always stay together, we will work hard together, and the results would come.
“We’ve just entered the crunch time, the last two months, and of course it's always good entering the crunch time with a win, but at the end we didn't achieve nothing at the moment, so it's always stay humble and keep working, and not just now talking about Wembley.
“It's great, I think everybody should enjoy this weekend, especially our fans, they have a long weekend to celebrate, they should do it, but we start preparing for Southampton [in the Premier League] tomorrow, because we need to be in our best shape playing the semi-finals.
“Therefore we can't say we switch off the next four weeks and then switch on again, so we will really keep working hard and then going for three points at Southampton.”
Special scenes accompanied the win at full-time at Craven Cottage, and Glasner smiled: “I enjoyed this atmosphere today.
“I think the whole of Craven Cottage, compared to the other game four or five weeks ago, the atmosphere, the vibe was completely different.
“When I entered the pitch I really appreciated this, because this is what I love about football: this feeling, this atmosphere, our fans with the red and blue balloons and celebrating…
“The whole stand behind the goal was full of Crystal Palace fans, so thank you very much for your support, and it's now time to make 50 per cent of Wembley full with red and blue!”