Oliver Glasner cut a frustrated figure on the sideline as he watched his Crystal Palace side suffer a 2-1 defeat to Brentford in their Premier League opener.
Annoyingly, Eberechi Eze saw his stunning freekick disallowed after a terrible decision from Sam Barrott, while Odsonne Edouard was also thwarted by the officials with an offside call after believing he had put Crystal Palace 2-1 ahead.
While the officiating mistake for Eze’s goal was out of our hands, Oliver Glasner could be heard complaining about something his Crystal Palace players could control during Sunday’s 2-1 loss…
What Stephen Warnock overheard Oliver Glasner saying
While covering the Premier League clash for BBC Radio 5 Live, Stephen Warnock overheard the Austrian complaining about his Crystal Palace side’s timidness in terms of shooting.
The 42-year-old said: “Very interestingly as Palace had the last attack Oliver Glasner turned around and said to his bench, do we not shoot?
“There was an opportunity to get the shot away from roughly 25 yards out. You have to change up your game, if you start shooting then people have to come out of their shape to close you down and that makes space for you to get in behind.”
Crystal Palace had 14 shots against Brentford – hitting six of those on target – although there were certainly times where we overworked attacks in the final third, or failed to play the correct pass at the right time.
For example, Eze really should have passed the ball to Tyrick Mitchell early in the first half, as the Crystal Palace No.3 found himself in acres of space on the left, only for his teammate to delay and allow Brentford to eventually block his shot.
It will come for Crystal Palace
As frustrating as this defeat is, the 2024/25 campaign is likely to be an exciting one for Crystal Palace if we keep performing like this.
It would have been an entirely different game if Eze’s goal was allowed to stand and Edouard also started his run just a little later before that offside goal, while the likes of Jean-Philippe Mateta only returned to training on Wednesday, so the team is not as well drilled as Glasner would presumably like it to be.
There are also some potential improvements to the starting XI on the way – Crystal Palace recently made an approach to sign Eddie Nketiah from Arsenal, for example.
Hopefully, officials will stop spoiling our games, and we can get three points on the board next Saturday against West Ham at Selhurst Park.
