Crystal Palace winger Andros Townsend: If we don’t score you are at risk of being rotated out

BY ANDREW MCSTEEN

Crystal Palace forward Andros Townsend got off the mark on Saturday – then admitted he had put himself at risk of being dropped after failing to hit peak performances in the opening weeks of the Premier League campaign.

Townsend came on as a 70th-minute substitute against Norwich City and scored in the second minute of additional time to ensure three points in a 2-0 home victory.

“If I’m being honest it’s not been a great start to the season for myself on a personal level,” said Townsend, who lost his place after the first two league games in which the Eagles picked up one point and failed to score.

“It wasn’t a bad start to the season but in the first two games we scored no goals and when you’re an attacking player and your team doesn’t score, you’re always vulnerable to getting rotated – we’ve got a good squad, the manager has rotated, and the team that has come in has done well so I’ve had to bide my time, do my stuff on the training field and make sure I’m ready.

“Players, especially forward players, go through spells where they can’t do no wrong and then sometimes can’t do nothing right and that happened [to me].

“I can’t have no complaints, but when the chance does come again, like it did today, I’m ready to fully grasp it and thankfully I got the goal today.

“Hopefully now the goal gives me a bit more confidence and I can kick on again and sooner rather than later break back into this team.”

Earlier this month, Townsend missed out on winning the Puskas Award at the FIFA 2019 ‘The Best’ Awards for his stunning strike last season against champions Manchester City and he revealed he is working hard to create more moments people can remember him by in the future, starting with West Ham away next week and then a home clash against Manchester City the following week.

“Now, when I see people in the street that’s the only thing they say to me: ‘oh, what a great goal’, it’s like I’m known for that goal,” he said “It’s nice, but once it’s gone it’s forgotten about and it’s all about the next game and the next goal. I’m not living off of that [though] I’ve forgotten about it now. I’m looking to score the next goal and get the next scalp against the next big team we play.

“Every now and then a few people come up to me [about playing for England], but mainly people say what a great goal it was against City. It’s nice that people remember the good that you do and hopefully there’s many more memories I can create this season and moving forward, but it’s nice to be remembered for that.

“West Ham away is going to be a difficult game and after that it doesn’t get any easier [when we play City],” he added. “We have to be fully-focused and as a team, for some reason or another, we always raise our level for the top sides and hopefully we can do that again.”

PICTURE BY KEITH GILLARD