Congrats Limey
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Still struggling to collect my thoughts on yesterday. The best part was having that moment with my nephews. After the final whistle blew we just hugged until stoic Uncle Limey collapsed into a blubbering mess.
Here’s a shot from during the hour-long, in-stadium, post-match celebration.
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Thanks to all for your support and congratulations. Here’s the start of what will likely be a stream of disorganized thoughts.
My favorite comment of the day - which I cannot remember if was from a pundit, fan, player or coach - was about City’s endless “pressure” (more on that later): you’re not pushing us back, you’re coiling a spring.
The first time we broke out without City immediately fouling the first player they could, we scored. We had talked before the game about how we score goals from breakouts, and it’s by getting the ball out to Mateta, him holding it up and laying it back to our center-mids who immediately feed the outside runners.
And that’s exactly what we did. The goal was as much a product of the training ground and a season of disciplined preparation as was the 100-minute defensive master class. We scored the same goal twice against Spurs in our previous match and multiple times in the season.
Teams should know it’s coming and be ready to counter it. In Pep’s case, he chose violence. For all City’s statistical dominance, they had 5 shots on target, one of which was a penalty, so only 4 good shots from open play in 100 minutes. Conversely, despite having 78% possession overall, they received 5 yellow cards (should’ve been many more) to Palace’s 1, which was for time wasting, not fouling.
All City’s cards came in the second half in desperation to stop the coiled spring unloading. It’s violence, it’s cheating, and it’s all Pep had.
After going 2-0 up and losing 5-2 at City a few weeks ago, Glasner said that if City did the same thing again they would not get the result. This wasn’t pre-final, this was immediately after the league loss. Glasner re-configured the defensive system to counter City and City had no answer for it.
So, as above, in the 78 minutes of possession, they crafted 4 shots on target plus the penalty (which should have not been given as Mitchell got the requisite touch on the ball). In Palace’s meager 22 minutes of possession, we crafter 3 shots on goal plus had a second goal chalked off by VAR for offside.
On a per minute basis, that’s one chance every 7 mins of possession for Palace and one every 16 mins for City. As to yellow cards (vs. time of opponent’s possession), it was one in 78 mins for Palace and 1 every 4 mins for City.
Pep got out-managed, and anyone with a sliver of understanding of football tactics knows it. That’s why he was triggered by Henderson offering his hand after the game. Instead of being a sportsman (or just a decent human being), Pep bitched at Henderson about time wasting. Henderson further cemented his legendary status by firing back “you got your 10 minutes, what more do you want?”
Henderson’s day is a post all of its own,
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Seems we made it on to SNL last night. Ego Nwodim sporting a classic away shirt known as “the evil sash” at the show’s closing.
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Dean Henderson had a day. Palace picked him up after he had been an occasional England international but who had been cast aside by Man Utd. At the time, we had another occasional England goalie in Sam Johnston, and the two competed for the starting spot. To be honest, fans broadly felt more comfortable with Johnston in goal.
As it turned out, what was holding back Henderson was a lack of confidence. That slowly recovered and, with Johnston traded away, he was now the automatic choice for starting goalie. But this season, he started poorly and fans became restless. No offense to Matt Turner as the back-up, but he was not the solution either.
The club persevered and Henderson improved. As we found out later, Henderson had lost his father in the opening week of the season and was, understandably, not all there. Ten months later, regardless of what the official reports state and no slight on Muñoz intended, Henderson was the true MOTM.
Should he have been sent off for a “DOGSO” in the first half? Absolutely.
Do I care? Absolutely not.
Wayne Rooney pitched a fit in the studio at halftime that Henderson was not sent packing. He’s not wrong, but I wonder if he was so hot on the purity of officiating after his teammate Smalling hauled down Palace’s Wickham as the last defender by 20 yards in the 2016 FA Cup final for which Rooney has a winner’s medal.
Henderson had made at least one good save before “the incident”. Afterwards, he saved a penalty and made a string of outstanding stops to deny City in those rare moments when the defensive shield cracked open. It was a team effort, he was the last line of a disciplined and drilled defense, and he did not let his team down.
I hope to see him in a Palace - and England - shirt for a good long while yet.
Pep being out-thought and Palace scoring the now ubiquitous Palace goal:
Ray, I think I speak for all of us when I say we could not be more thrilled for you and Palace fans everywhere. As you are aware, I know only slightly more than squat about football, but I have been a Palace fan vicariously through you, as much as I can be I suppose.
Screw all those other guys. Enjoy this.
Palace! Palace! Palace!
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Ditto.
I had to look up what the FA Cup is yesterday but I could not be happier for you.
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I travelled with two of the Houston chapter of the CPFC in the USA fan club. Well, not quite, we each were on different airlines flying at different times while arriving simultaneously at different terminals of Heathrow airport.
Arriving Thursday afternoon, our first order of business was to join the “Five Year Plan” podcast’s pre-match drink-up at the Founder’s Arms, appropriately on the south London side of the River Thames. Matt has been a frequent guest on the podcast, which is run by some comedians/Palace fans (but I repeat myself). We had a great time mingling with hundreds of fans and the podcast hosts for the evening.
The next day Matt was occupied so Roland - the other travel partner - and I hit the British Museum. He was once an amateur Egyptologist with thoughts of taking it professional but never did, and it was an educational day. Later that night, the three of us hit up some historic pubs and bumped into an actual Egyptologist among other interesting folks. We even randomly encountered a Palace fan from California over for the match.
Then it was game day. My nephews were joining us for the game and this was a joy for me. They are two fantastic young men who have endured more than their share of shit from the universe in their young lives. Their mother died from cancer before the oldest was even 10 and their deadbeat father - my brother - abandoned them literally a few years later.
In the aftermath of that, I did not do all I could have to help their situation and they were taken in by their aunt (mother’s sister) who shepherded them into adulthood. I will carry that guilt forever, and so whatever I can do for them now is a but a small gesture. One thing I wanted, though, was to share the cup final with them.
I was up at 3am on the day the tickets became available to fans of my status. A status shared by Matt, Roland, my eldest nephew Ben but not Nick. He was one tier down and so when I got tickets for the group I could only get 4. The plan was to book two pairs of seats with a gap in the middle into which Nick could slide later. We got our tickets as planned.
But that was all for tickets. Nick was on the wait list but a buying opportunity never arose. He could not afford a scalped ticket, so he was going to miss out. But not on my watch.
I scalped him a ticket from as reputable a re-seller I could find. Better to pay more than to run the risk of being ripped off or, worse, leaving Nick stuck outside Wembley with a bogus ticket. I could not select anything more the seat’s end and level, so we knew he would be inside but not exactly where.
Here’s where the karma that has been ever-present in this adventure began to manifest itself. When I received Nick’s ticket (which was a relief in itself), it was not only on the same level as the rest of us, but in our block and only a few rows directly behind us. If nothing else, he would be nearby.
We met at Covent Garden for breakfast and to enjoy the “takeover” by Palace fans. We eschewed the march with the Holmesdale Fanatics from CG to the tube and thence to Wembley, as we had to get up to the stadium for the BBC interview.
With that done, we decided to get inside early so that we could make sure Nick’s ticket worked. I hung back in case we needed to contact the re-seller, but Nick blew through the turnstile so fast I didn’t realize he was even inside. Karma upon karma.
As the stadium filled we took our seats and for the longest time, the middle seat cuckoo was nowhere to be seen. Maybe Nick can just take an unoccupied seat. Then, a bloke not in Palace colors arrived to take “his” seats. Not only was he not in Palace colors, he had an accent with a distinctive Manchester twang to it.
We introduced ourselves and he reassured us that he was there for the Palace. I explained our situation, pointed out Nick just behind us in the stand and he made the seat exchange without a moment’s thought. Karma upon karma upon karma.
So that is how I got to share the moment with my nephews. Nothing I can do will ever make up for the underservedly huge shit sandwich the universe served those two young men - nor my part in not being there enough for them - but we will forever have that moment.
And now please excuse me while I collapse again into an emotional wreck.
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Legends all.
Treatment received by these two is some of the “time wasting” Pep complained about. Fuck that guy.
Fun Fact: Chris Richards and Matt Turner become the 3rd and 4th Americans to earn an FA Cup winners medal, following Tim Howard in 2004 and Julian Sturgis in 1873. Yes, you read that right.
Limey can you explain why Henderson started wearing a baseball hat in the second half?
Sun blazing right in his eyes.
One of the many, many stupid design decisions made when building the new Wembley.
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Need to introduce the Brits to
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The end of his season has been pretty disappointing for Fulham but doing the double on Brentford is fucking sweet
Love you Harry Wilson
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This is also Palace’s first time to qualify for Europa, correct?
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Correct. We have played in - and won - a limited European tournament before, but this will be the first ever “proper” European adventure.
The side benefits of winning yesterday are myriad and valuable:
- We play the season curtain-raising Charity Shield match against Liverpool on Aug 9
- Our raised profile should mean more live TV matches which means a bigger share of the overflowing pot of domestic TV money
- Europa guarantees 8 matches of money-spinning European football
- Plus a lot more if we can progress out of the league portion
- Plus a place in the eye-wateringly rich UCL with a win
It also means that we have a better chance of not being asset-stripped by richer clubs. In addition to being able to pay them more with Europa-Bucks, the pool of suitors for our stars (and manager) just got reduced only to those clubs also playing in Europe. For example, that means one of Man Utd and Spurs is not going to be in the mix.
And if you think I’m still suffering brain melt from yesterday when suggesting that winning the Europa is possible: look at Man Utd…then look at Palace…then look at Spurs…then look at Palace.
We have proven ourselves better than both this year’s finalists. To the tune of 3 wins, 1 draw, 0 losses, scoring 5 goals and conceding none.
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I know that public financing of private sports is intellectualy and ethically dubious, but I love urban infrastructure projects like this. I was just at the Alamodome for the Final Four and this project will make San Antonio all the nicer.
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