Palace can’t break down shaky Chelsea youths

In front of another 1,000 plus crowd at Bromley FC, Palace could not recover from an early setback.

The appearance of Danny Butterfield was a welcome sight for the Palace faithful who’d made the trek to the Kent borders.

The only goal of the game came on 11 minutes. Fabio Ferreira sent over a slightly deflected left foot cross, Jimmy Smith’s header was saved but Phil Younghusband was on hand to turn it in past David Wilkinson.

Chelsea’s erratic reserve keeper, Lenny Pidgeley was lucky to escape five minutes later when an excursion outside his area went wrong but Jon Macken was closed down too quickly. Just prior to that Pidgeley had stretched to tip over a looping Grabban header. Macken had two attempts for Palace before the half-hour was completed, driving wide both times with Pidgeley beaten, but succumbed to another injury shortly before the break.

Going with the slope, Palace were much stronger in the second half with Rhoys Wiggins tormenting down the left. The clown that is Pidgeley really should have been sent off first for blatantly stepping out of the box to grasp a ball, then for giving the officials shedloads of obscene abuse when the free kick was given.

At death, Palace couldn’t quite scramble the ball home after a Pidgeley failed to hold a header from Charlie Sheringham, and then Lewis Grabban managed to hit the lucky keeper on the line with his shot.

Palace: Wilkinson, Butterfield (Dayton 45), Wilson (c), Fray (Swaibu 45), Granville, J Hughes, Straker, Spence, Wiggins, Grabban, Macken (Sheringham 40).



Posted by neil