Oliver Glasner: ‘Plenty of positives for Crystal Palace to take from Spurs win ahead of FA Cup Final’

Oliver Glasner said there were plenty of positives for his Crystal Palace side to take into their FA Cup Final against Manchester City after their 2-0 win against Tottenham on Sunday afternoon.

The Eagles thought they took the lead after seven minutes on the counter-attack when Daniel Munoz swept a cross along the face of goal for Isamila Sarr to score, but a VAR review showed that Jean-Philippe Mateta was offside in the build-up.

Dejan Kulusavski had Tottenham’s first chance of the game, flashing a shot in the 12th minute which deflected off Maxence Lacroix and out of a corner.

Daniel Munoz smashed an effort off the crossbar in the 29th minute and should have done better when played through moments later. However, the Colombian right wing-back chose to play a pass to Mateta in front of goal instead of whipping the ball beyond Antonin Kinsky.

Sarr was in a similar position to the right-hand side of the goal but Ben Davis threw his body on the line to block the Senegalese forward’s shot.

Lacroix had the ball in the back of the net for Palace again in the 43rd minute, but referee Christopher Kavanagh ruled the goal out for a Marc Guhi handball on the line.

Palace made their dominance count on the stroke of half-time when Eberechi Eze was on hand to tap Munoz’s run and cross into the back of the net.

VAR reviewed Munoz’s run, but it was third time lucky for Glasner’s side as they took the lead at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

Palace quickly doubled their lead at the start of the second half when Eze finished off a counter-attacking move with Sarr, driving a low finish from just inside the area beyond Kinsky.

Glasner made a number of changes in the closing stages of the game, with Romain Esse, Daichi Kamada and Ben Chilwell all coming on to help see out the encounter.

Heung-Min Son broke through on goal in the 89th minute after being played through by Mathys Tel. However, the South Korean attacker was unable to squeeze a shot beyond Marc Guehi, who had got back to block the effort.

The Eagles now have 49 points with two games left – equalling their record tally first set during the 1992-93 season and matched both in 2018-19 and 2023-24.

Glasner’s side head to Wembley next Saturday to take on Manchester City in the final of the FA Cup.

“It’s a credit to the players,” said Glasner.

“Their energy levels, intensity, effort and commitment, they showed from the beginning.

“Especially in the first half, we had so many chances. I was impressed. We scored a goal and it was disallowed.

“We scored again and it was disallowed. We missed chances and then hit the post, but we just kept going and going.

“It was a really good performance. To be a little self-critical, after the second goal, this reduced all of this by a few percentage.

“But the performance was really good. The clean sheet was really good.

“There were lots of positives to take ahead of the FA Cup Final.”

PICTURE: KEITH GILLARD