Romain Esse has endured a difficult month at Crystal Palace.
The England U21 international was handed a rare start by Oliver Glasner in the Carabao Cup win over Millwall, but found himself hauled off at the interval after a terrible performance.
It led to some fairly brutal comments from the Austrian after the game where he suggested the Londoner’s work off the ball was not good enough, saying: “If you have 20 sprinting meters in a cup game against a Championship side, you are not competitive. The game is too quick for this.
“You need to be ready with the basics and then you can show your skills. The challenge we all have for Romain – get the basics right to show his skills.
“With just the skill, you get punished and lose too many balls in the Premier League.”
Since then, Esse has dropped down and played two games for the Crystal Palace U21 side in a bid to rediscover his spark, which he seems to have already managed.
Romain Esse responds admirably to Oliver Glasner criticism
There is no denying that the 20-year-old is a talented attacker, exemplified by his excellent strike in a 3-2 win over the Leeds U21 side on Monday 22nd September, and on his weaker foot no less.
However, as aforesaid, the issue Glasner has is what Esse does out of possession, and it seems as if the Millwall academy graduate has listened.
A 4-1 loss to the Manchester United U21 side followed that win over Leeds, where FotMob show that the Crystal Palace No.21 won more duels than any other player on the pitch with ten.
Esse also won five freekicks – more than anyone else managed – registering four ball recoveries, three successful tackles and one foul, which shows he put plenty of work in to help his team regain possession.
Fortunately, this defensive work did not seem to negatively impact his attacking numbers either, as the £14.5m January arrival from Millwall also recorded three key passes, two dribbles and a 70% passing accuracy against the Manchester United U21 side.
Of course, the challenge for Esse – who Millwall fans mocked – is to showcase his obvious ability in the Premier League on a regular basis rather than at U21 level, but his response to a public dressing down from Glasner has been admirable.
Oliver Glasner clearly likes Romain Esse
Some might understandably feel that Glasner dislikes Esse – who Dougie Freedman personally scouted – having effectively hung the youngster out to dry in the media.
However, the 51-year-old rarely speaks about players like this, which we find telling.
No such pressure has been put on the likes of Matheus Franca or Jesurun Rak-Sakyi since Glasner replaced Roy Hodgson in February 2024, which suggests to us that the man born in Salzburg sees promise in Esse and wants to push him.
If Glasner felt Esse had no chance of making it, we highly doubt he would be giving the attacker this much attention.
