Crystal Palace 1-2 Spurs

The report in full...

After a fairly uneventful first half at Selhurst Park, we came to life in the opening stages of the second period and went ahead when Joel Ward put through his own net from James Maddison’s drilled cross and doubled the lead on 66 minutes, Heung-Min Son putting the finishing touch to a superb move for his eighth goal of the season.

The visitors reduced the deficit deep into stoppage time through Jordan Ayew and threw everything at us in search of an equaliser, but we held out for the victory. And, as if being five points clear wasn’t good enough, the night was capped by the return of Rodrigo Bentancur, back in action for the last few minutes following a lengthy ACL injury lay-off.

We may have dominated the first-half possession statistics but it was Palace with the better chances, Guglielmo Vicario making two fine saves early on. The first came on six minutes after Will Hughes broke through the middle and found Ayew to his right, but his effort was parried away by Vicario and the goalkeeper made an even better stop moments later, down quickly to his left to save Odsonne Edouard’s snap shot.

Much of the game was happening in the midfield areas and we were finding it difficult to create any openings, although Richarlison and Maddison linked up nicely down the left on 20 minutes but the Brazil international dragged his shot wide from the edge of the area.

The home side forced a flurry of corners in the closing stages of the first period which we dealt with fairly comfortably, Joachim Andersen heading well over in the closest Palace came with any of them.

It was the first time this season that we didn’t manage a shot on target in the first half but eight minutes after the break we opened the scoring. Just moments after the ball skipped past Edouard inside our six-yard box at one end, Pape Matar Sarr’s blocked cross fell to Maddison and he volleyed the ball into the danger zone where it cannoned off Ward and flew into the net.

Another Palace corner saw Marc Guehi glance a header wide when he should have done better but we doubled our lead in the 66^th minute with a wonderfully-worked goal. It started from Vicario, with Sarr’s cross-field ball picking out substitute Brennan Johnson, he and Maddison combined for the former to cut it back and there was Son to side-foot a volley past Sam Johnstone.

That goal allowed us to gain a real control over the contest as we kept Palace at arm’s length, frustrating the home fans by keeping possession for long periods and whenever the Eagles did get close to our goal, some superb defending kept them out.

However, they did pull one back four minutes into stoppage time, Ayew rifling home with a right-footed finish which needed a lengthy VAR check before the goal was confirmed after the Palace forward appeared to control the ball with his arm. That gave them a lift and they applied some late pressure, but when Matheus Franca blazed wide in the 102^nd minute, with it went their opportunity of salvaging an equaliser.

That was our fourth win on the bounce and we remain unbeaten in the Premier League after 10 games this season.