Crystal Palace Fan View: Injury crisis haunts Crystal Palace as Tottenham grab late winner

Crystal Palace have toed the line a fair amount in our time as a Premier League team, but today could well have taken the biscuit if we’d nicked something – Tottenham battered us.

Harry Kane was uncharacteristically wasteful in front of goal – he missed two from within 6 yards, among other chances, while Serge Aurier appeared to have learnt a thing or two from Christian Benteke when it comes to spurning chances it appears easier to score… They created chance after chance, but a mixture of Crystal Palace’s doggedness and Tottenham’s wastefulness meant things were all square until the death, before all of a sudden we were left pointless.

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Hennessey keeps Crystal Palace in the game… then doesn’t

Wayne Hennessey & Christian Benteke are pantomime villains within the Crystal Palace ranks and today was no different. Hennessey made a string of saves to keep us in the game, turning Davies’ effort round the post, diving at the feet of others as they went to get their shot off. However it wasn’t a perfect performance – he looked fragile aerially, which culminated in the goal which he got a hand to, but didn’t prevent going in.

Christian Benteke had a thankless task, but his lack of mobility and outward effort doesn’t help his cause when it comes to popularity with the fans. Some strikers you’ll see work their socks off, giving their all to the cause. It may be pointless expended effort, but it shows willing and when you haven’t scored in as long as Benteke hasn’t and moments of inspiration are thin on the ground, sometimes you have to do just that.

If we had other options, I’m certain they would be employed by now.

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Missing players are a huge part of our struggles

I knew it was going to be difficult heading into this game, but the casualties were more extensive than I had anticipated. Yohan Cabaye was missing, Wan-Bissaka was drafted into the first team as Joel Ward missed out and Fosu-Mensah reprised his role at centre-half.

To his credit, Wan-Bissaka delivered on his debut, but the fact that Hodgson was forced into starting an Under-23 player in a game as big as this is indicative of just how deeply our injuries are hurting us.

For all of our injuries in defence, we held on for nearly the whole game (and you have to wonder what would have happened if Tomkins hadn’t been forced off) but while we could have succeeded in not conceding, we didn’t look like scoring in a month of Sundays. The worry is that there is a strong correlation with Zaha’s absence and our inability to score and therefore win games – nobody needs me to tell them what a problem that is.