Crystal Palace FC Thread + Championship Chat

[Matt.NFFC.]

Taffs
Watford
Dull
Palarse
Bin Robbers
Super Forest

Wolves
Peterborough
Brizzle

[anthonyl]

What's your best championship first 11 and subs? That means championship players not ones on loan to champ sides!

Schmeichal

Konchesky
Morgan
Hudson
Brayford

Bellamy
Bridcutt
Dikagcoi
Lansbury
Ince

Murray

Bench

Kuschczak, hobbs, jedinak, Williams, bolasie, wood, austin

[Chompy]

No Watford players? Chalobah or Vydra?

[TightEnd]

Wouldn't have Konchesky in there, has been the weakest of our back 5.

Agree with Morgan/Hudson

Brayford, Bridcutt and Lansbury..no thanks

prefer to see Chabaloh, a second striker like Austin and good old Zaha in there

You also forgot Will Hughes, a great talent

Where's Whittingham..best dead ball striker in the division for the leaders?

could easily pick Marshall over Schmeichel


easy to pick it, huh?!

[Acidmouse]

could easily pick Marshall over Schmeichel

Schmeichel not as good as Kenny. Glad we got rid tbh.

[TightEnd]

could easily pick Marshall over Schmeichel

Schmeichel not as good as Kenny. Glad we got rid tbh.

disagree. Schmeichel has been terrific for two years. Cannot stand Kenny though accept he's very good

Marshall is better than both though


and you didn't "get rid". He left, you wanted him to stay

[Chompy]

Butland has to go in goal and Vydra > Austin for me. Zaha a must also. I'd have Tommy Rowe at left-back but am biased obv.

[scotty2hatty]

Wow. Speroni in goal obv. And Rhodes as the main man.

[Acidmouse]

could easily pick Marshall over Schmeichel

Schmeichel not as good as Kenny. Glad we got rid tbh.

disagree. Schmeichel has been terrific for two years. Cannot stand Kenny though accept he's very good

Marshall is better than both though


and you didn't "get rid". He left, you wanted him to stay

Kenny is an idiot with the brains of a 1 year old agreed.

I thought club pushed him out for the £1m on offer, didn't think he put the feelers out to leave. He is a good keeper without question but imo not a great one yet.

[Ant040689]

could easily pick Marshall over Schmeichel

Schmeichel not as good as Kenny. Glad we got rid tbh.

disagree. Schmeichel has been terrific for two years. Cannot stand Kenny though accept he's very good

Marshall is better than both though


and you didn't "get rid". He left, you wanted him to stay

Kenny is an idiot with the brains of a 1 year old agreed.

I thought club pushed him out for the £1m on offer, didn't think he put the feelers out to leave. He is a good keeper without question but imo not a great one yet.

Weird you say 'yet' in terms of him maybe improving a lot in years to come. I know goalkeepers can play until they are 40 but I can't imagine you expect keeper to improve much at all from 34 onwards.

Currently I think he is a great keeper. Always have been impressed with his claiming, shot stopping and general all round capability. For him to be dropped for Rob Green I think was a farce at QPR. I probably don't know him well enough to pick out noticeable weaknesses, but I think when he was in the prem recently, I saw that sometimes he was slow getting down to some shots, that others would have got to, but I dunno.

As anthonyl did say no loan players he immediately meant Zaha, and most of the Watford team weren't allowed.

I can't testify to know much about other team's players so would be useless naming a championship side, but will instead give you players I think from Palace that stand close, probably for pushing the best current league starting 11.

They are:

Jonny Williams
Julian Speroni
Glenn Murray
Mile Jedinak

That is obv not including Zaha because he is not owned by the club anymore.

Notable mention to Julian Speroni as well, I think I have gone on about the others a lot already, but I think this season someone has taught him how to deal with crosses properly. He used to be a complete liability from this and always let in cheap goals. Now he has a solid command of his box, so generally, there aren't many weakness with him, and because of his personality he is my favourite Palace player.

[aaron1867]

Bellamy?

I am not a Cardiff fan, but not seen enough of him this season in the headlines to say he warrants a place in the first 11.

[DungBeetle]

Think I'd rather have Speroni if I had my pick of all the keepers to be honest.

[TightEnd]

Speroni is a strange one for me. Never ever rated him. Must have seen him 6-7 times live and still never rated him

Yet others rave over him. I must have a blind spot!

[DungBeetle]

I probably haven't seen him enough to make my opinion worth much Tighty, but it just seems I've seen him have some absolute blinders down the years so am biased I guess.

[Ant040689]

Speroni is a strange one for me. Never ever rated him. Must have seen him 6-7 times live and still never rated him

Yet others rave over him. I must have a blind spot!

You don't. It took me years to understand why he was our number 1. He got a lot of player of the year awards and I couldn't see past his liability from crosses and in the air, generally. He was always meek in his communication to his defenders whereby they would often clear balls in over the top, even though Speroni had called for it to claim himself. He, for years, had hardly any 100% respect from his back four. I would say at the start of this season have I seen that turnaround, where for some reason he thinks he is a boss, and he's the man and has got that bollocks that just heightens every other asset he had, because now he is complete. Obviously not world class, but no real flaws in his game at all now, so great stuff.

He is relatively small for a keeper at 6'1, doesn't seem to be the quickest in foot when playing, but he has awesome reactions, his positioning in 1 on 1's is awesome. Closes down the angle and smothers when he knows to, and stands up when he knows they will probably take it around him. His positioning generally is top drawer as well from shots coming in. He sometimes enjoys a good camera save from long shots, but maybe it is just the way he falls afterwards. They may not be as easy to save as he is making out, so probably good there.

You just need to hear the great reviews he gets from all our past managers to know that most of them would have him in their team now. I know Warnock wanted him at QPR and despite his affinity to Kenny, would probably put Speroni in ahead of him if he had the chance now, I know Freedman probably would imo, as I think Bogdan is bluffing a career in goalkeeping. With Warnock, he did try to buy him while at QPR, purportedly, as well.

It really is an awesome feeling having such a good keeper between the sticks. His last away game to Derby was one of the best goalkeeping performances I have seen live.

His distribution is unbelievably good. You should see him before the game, picks out the sub goalie with drop kicks, 9/10, the other guy doesn't have to move. He is great then as a part of our counter attack system to hit Murray exactly where he should, or put it to the gap, nearly without fail when it is asked of him.

So Tighty I would say he isn't extravagantly good in any aspect, and you could quite easily gloss over him when you see him, but that often is a sign of a good keeper in a way, when you don't see him make many errors and is generally very solid. And then when Palace are under the cosh, he steps up and saves us time and time again, with displays that make attackers just think they can't do anything.

Gonna put out a shout from left field here. On the basis of the one game I saw of Peterborough at London Road, I thought their keeper Robert Olejnik was superb. I wonder what Chompy thinks of him generally?