Vieira on Zaha fitness and new signings featuring at Old Trafford

First-team

28 Jan 2023

Patrick Vieira says both Naouirou Ahamada and Sambi Lokonga will be in the matchday squad when Palace take on Manchester United on Saturday, as both new signings look to make an impact straight away.

“I’m really pleased with the two players that we managed to bring,” Vieira said in his pre-match press conference. “It’s a different profile to what we have and that will give me a different option in the games. Both of them will be in the squad tomorrow.

“Ahamada is really mobile, running in behind, stretching the opposition team. His intensity and work on the field is really good and that is what I am really pleased that we brought him into the football club.

“[Lokonga] has experience of knowing the Premier League. He has got technical ability to play well and to improve our play. I still believe that there is more to come from him, because he is capable of running in behind and getting involved in the opposition box. His mobility and strength will help us.

“What is important is for him to get more involved and play more games. We will give him that opportunity. Of course, he will have to work hard to deserve to get that space. But he believes that this was the right decision for the next step for his career, and we will work with him and improve him like we did with a couple of other players we had on loan.”

Palace will, however, be without top scorer Wilfried Zaha for the trip to Manchester United.

“Wilfried is still on the treatment table,” Vieira confirmed. “Obviously his injury will take him a couple of weeks, so we have to do without him.

“Wilfried is someone who recovers quite quickly, but we don’t want to put a date on his injury. We are just going to let him work with the medical staff and get him back as soon as possible.

“[Nathan Ferguson and James McArthur] are progressing really well. They trained with the first-team for the last couple of weeks so they are in a really good position, but it is too short for them to be involved in the first-team at the minute. There is a protocol in place that is important for us to follow but they are doing well.

“Joachim Andersen is slowly progressing, but he is not available for the game tomorrow.”

With 12 wins in their last 12 games at home, Vieira is aware that he is facing a Manchester United side in a rich vein of form.

“They are in a really good period – they are playing well, scoring a lot of goals,” he said. “But we played them recently and we went toe-to-toe against them. We worked very hard against them, we played some good football at times but if we want a positive result we have to raise the quality of the game.

“It’s about how we play for 95 minutes as a team to compete and we have to do that to take something from it.

“[A strong mentality] should be a given for us as a football club and as a team. We have to concentrate, we have to be competitive, we have to have a really good game programme to challenge United.

“We know how difficult it will be but again we have the attributes to play a really good game of football against them.”

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