Oliver Glasner on his ‘excellent’ Crystal Palace players fully deserving victory at Manchester United
Oliver Glasner said the effort that his Crystal Palace side put in against Manchester United meant they fully deserved their 2-0 win over Manchester United.
A Jean-Philippe Mateta brace saw them win 2-0 at Old Trafford on Sunday.
The Eagles had chances to take the lead early on, with Tyrick Mitchell whipping a cross across the face of goal that both Ismaila Sarr and Mateta were unable to convert.
Mateta went close again to putting Palace ahead when he was played behind United’s defence by Jefferson Lerma. But the French striker’s left-footed shot was agonisingly wide of Andre Onana’s goal.
United came out the better team at the start of the second half and Bruno Fernandes forced Dean Henderson into a smart save down to his right-hand side.
Palace eventually took the lead in the 63rd minute when Maxcence Lacroix’s header looped over Onana and on to the crossbar. The ball landed perfectly in front of Mateta for him to net his ninth Premier League goal of the season and break the deadlock.
Palace killed off the game with two minutes of normal time remaining when Sarr played through Daniel Munoz on the counter attack and beyond the United defence. The Colombian squared the ball along the face of goal for Mateta to smash home.
Glasner said: “I want to pass the congratulations to the players because they put on an excellent performance.
“The first 10 minutes and the first 10 minutes of the second half, Man United had too many set-plays and they had two or three chances where Dean Henderson had to make one or two big saves.
“It’s normal when you have periods in the game at Old Trafford where you have to struggle. But everything else was how we expected it. We encouraged the players to stick to the plan and to keep the belief – we will get our moments and situations.
“The players did it until the end and waited for the decisive moments.
“We scored an opener with a set-play and then it was an excellent second goal.
“The effort was amazing today and that’s why we deserved to win today.”
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