Crystal Palace dashed Wolverhampton Wanderers ’ European hopes further by inflicting a third straight Premier League defeat on Bruno Lage ’s team. Jean-Philippe Mateta and Wilfried Zaha (pen) scored in the first half to give Palace a 2-0 win at Molineux on a dire day for Wolves. Wolves produced the worst 45-minute performance of the Bruno Lage era to trail at the break. Palace’s front three of Zaha, Mateta and Michael Olise caused numerous issues for Lage’s defence, but many of Wolves’ problems were of their own making.
Bruno Lage said: “It’s a warning for me and my players. I will not tolerate this 45 minutes again. I will see the behaviour of each one. Like I said to you three weeks ago, we have 40 points and I don’t want anyone to relax. They need to understand, if you’re not in a good moment and looking to relax playing the way you used to play, they are out of the team. They need to understand that. I want to bring success to the club and I don’t accept this 45 minutes, especially in front of our fans.”
Crystal Palace manager said,
Patrick Viera said: “It was the perfect performance away from home. We were really solid, created a lot of chances. I’m really pleased with the attitude, character and organisation we showed today. That is the best 45 minutes we have played since I have been at the football club and it is important for us to build on the last couple of games. Today it was not just about the result it was about the performance, and the performance was really good. We know we are capable of playing good football but we weren’t consistent enough so far.”
