Crystal Palace Fan View: 3 things to look out for at Wembley

Crystal Palace on the cusp of another unwanted record

Five games into the new season Crystal Palace set the record for the worst ever start to a Premier League season, but that’s not all. Those same five results saw us become the first top-flight team in the history of English football to lose their first five games without scoring a single goal. Just to put that in context, in the last 139 seasons and from 2,464 teams not a single one has had a worse start to the season.

No need to stop there though. Just to ensure that record stood the test of time, we extended that run to six and then then against Manchester City followed by United. That won’t be broken in a while…

The reason for dragging all that back up again is that this weekend we could equal another record. Mauricio Pochettino has never conceded at home to Crystal Palace and if that record continues we will equal Derby County’s record of failing to score in the opening six away matches of a season. If we can possibly avoid any more comparisons with that Derby side, that would be nice.

Read more: Eagles fight back for a point against West Ham

Read more: Eagles must prove Chelsea fightback wasn’t a one off

Tottenham throw down the guantlet against Real Madrid

It was hard not to be impressed, and slightly rueful, watching Tottenham’s deserved win over Real Madrid in midweek. Impressed because Tottenham were fantastic, rueful because Crystal Palace really aren’t…

This game has importance too, Spurs will see this as anything but a dead rubber thanks to their league position. They’re already eight points behind pace-setters Manchester City, three behind United and are only a point ahead of Chelsea & Arsenal, who have both been criticised for their under-performance this season. They need to win this weekend to stay in touch.

They seem to have broken any ‘Wembley jinx’, the talismanic Harry Kane is back fit and the lapse against West Ham means Mauricio Pochettino will surely ensure that Crystal Palace won’t benefit from a similar lack of focus.

Read more: Wilfried Zaha steers Eagles towards road to redemption

Read more: Back to reality after Bristol City humbling

Recent performances provide reason for optimism

Enough with the pessimism.

With respect to team news, Tottenham’s defence has been a strength, but it will be without Hugo Lloris and Alderweireld when Crystal Palace visit. While Spurs’ side will be weakened, both Mamadou Sakho & James McArthur will be back in contention which is obviously a boost for Palace. While an injury to a player is never a good thing, Patrick van Aanholt’s absence is far from the end of the world. He’s been a weakness at full back for weeks, his positioning and general defensive competence is questionable and that has been illustrated time and time again – Bristol City was the icing on the cake in that respect.

The Chelsea performance and result a couple of weeks ago was huge. We’ve not followed it up in quite the way anyone would have liked, a draw at home to struggling West Ham and loss to Newcastle looks on paper like we could have done better, but performances in patches have reminded us what we’re capable of. We held Newcastle, at St. James’ Park, for over an hour and truly battered West Ham in the second half. It was only an inspired Joe Hart that saw West Ham get a single thing from that game from 2-0 up.

That’s why we can take the positives and look ahead with cautious optimism. I am of the unwavering belief that this side, with the ingenuity of Zaha and Townsend, the quality of Cabaye and Loftus-Cheek and the strength of players like Milivojevic and Sakho means we can compete with the best sides in the country when it all comes together. It came together against Chelsea, here’s hoping it can come together again on Sunday for another shock result.