Crystal Palace beat Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 in the Premier League on Sunday thanks to a Jean-Philippe Mateta goal to finally claim its first win of the season and climb out of the relegation zone.
The victory eased the pressure on manager Oliver Glasner as Palace moved up to 17th with six points, two points clear of the drop zone, while Tottenham remains in eighth spot with 13 points.
Palace started the game with much more intensity and its high press yielded the opening goal when Tottenham shot itself in the foot trying to pass the ball out from the back.
Daniel Munoz pinched the ball from Spurs centre-back Micky van de Ven when the Dutch defender slipped and the wing-back put a cross into the box which was expertly flicked by Eberechi Eze to an unmarked Mateta who fired home.
“Very important, first win this season and we worked hard to have another win. It was important to win against Tottenham. The first three points,” Mateta told Sky Sports.
“Every day in training, I always want to show the manager that I’m fit and can score for the team... I say every time, if he (Eze) plays good then we would win. Today he gave me the pass,” he added.
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Without injured skipper Son Heung-min, Spurs struggled to mount attacks while 17-year-old winger Mikey Moore - making his first Premier League start - could not replicate his dazzling performance in the Europa League three days ago.
Eze nearly made it 2-0 minutes into the second half but had his goal ruled out for a marginal offside when he tried to capitalise on Spurs’ high line. Palace’s appeal for a penalty when he went down in the box moments later was denied.
But Spurs was well and truly on the back foot and had goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario to thank as he kept it in the game with some fine saves as Palace spurned opportunities to double its lead, with Munoz and Eze firing wide.
Spurs boss Ange Postecoglou had seen enough and he made a triple substitution to introduce Richarlison, Pape Sarr and Timo Werner for the last half-hour, but they were unable to make any impact on the game as Palace’s defence stood strong.
“It was one of those games with a lot of stoppages and battles and they ended up winning a lot of them and coming out on top,” Postecoglou said.
“There was a lot of disruption and it was hard to get any fluency. They did better than us. It turned into a game they were thriving on and we should have dealt with it better. It was a poor goal to concede,” he added.
The Selhurst Park crowd groaned in unison when seven minutes were added on at the end of the second half but the home fans erupted when the referee blew the final whistle as Palace claimed its first league win since May.
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