Only compliments were being said about Crystal Palace back in May, when Michael Olise was sending Casemiro collapsing to the turf like collateral damage en route to goal.
Fewer than 150 days have passed since the Eagles mauled Manchester United 4-0 in the Selhurst Park mizzle — Palace, at the time, in the midst of season-ending form the likes of which even their most ardent fans had never seen coming.
Six wins in their final seven league games of last season represented a barnstorming run-in. Their start to this campaign, though, could scarcely be more different.
In Saturday’s two-way battle for a first Premier League win of the season, it was under-fire Sean Dyche and Everton who came up trumps, as below-par Palace fell to a third league defeat of the season already. They have just three points, all from draws.
The Eagles dominated possession, had 17 shots to Everton’s eight, but Dwight McNeil’s second-half double now leaves Palace in the relegation zone at the end of a Premier League weekend for the first time since March 2018.
Beaten by Brentford, West Ham and Everton, and having needed a stoppage-time penalty to salvage a draw at home to newly promoted Leicester City a fortnight ago, Palace supporters are quite understandably left wondering where their first league win of the season is going to come from.
The disjointed displays and dismal results also raise just a kernel of doubt over Oliver Glasner’s role in last season’s magnificent run-in. Was he quite as central to that success as first thought, or was it more simply that Olise and Eberechi Eze were both fit and firing?
Either way, Olise’s exit for Bayern Munich this summer was preordained to hit Palace hard. It has done. The quality of crossing and shooting in the final third has taken a hit in the early months of the new season. Olise has as many goals for Bayern this season as Palace have netted in the league.
Glasner has not been able to count on the form of last term from key trio Adam Wharton, Jean-Philippe Mateta and Eze, still yet to get up to speed and perhaps still feeling the effects of the longest season of their careers (Wharton and Eze were at Euro 2024 with England; Mateta led the line for France’s Under-23s at the Paris Olympics).
Though recruitment was shrewd and well thought-through this summer, as can invariably be relied upon from sporting director Dougie Freedman, the Eagles’ new signings have looked off the pace.
Only one can be spared of that assessment: Eddie Nketiah, who has been lively since joining from Arsenal and looks set to deliver an impressive first season’s shift at Selhurst Park. Daichi Kamada and Maxence Lacroix, while producing their best displays yet against Everton, look as though they still need more time.
And while selling Joachim Andersen back to Fulham and losing new signing Chadi Riad to injury explain part of it, Glasner is far from having a settled backline. The Austrian has changed his back three for every league game so far.
Glasner can look forward to Trevoh Chalobah’s gradual integration into the team and Cheick Doucoure’s return to his pre-injury level (at some point), but his priority must be hauling his side out of the bottom three in the here and now.
Yet with the only two wins of the season coming against Championship opposition in the Carabao Cup, quite where the points will come from is a question with no immediately obvious answer.
Lose at home to league leaders Liverpool in Saturday’s early kick-off and Palace will remain in the relegation zone throughout the October international break — a grim position to be in. They are too talented to stay winless forever, but few saw the Eagles nosediving this far this quickly.
