‘Woefully short’ – Roy Hodgson delivers assessment after Crystal Palace’s heavy defeat at Newcastle

Crystal Palace boss Roy Hodgson labelled his side’s performance as “woefully short” following their 4-0 defeat at Newcastle United on Saturday.

The hosts went ahead after five minutes when Kieran Trippier found Jacob Murphy down the left-hand side and the winger looped the ball over Sam Johnstone.

Newcastle, who had squandered a handful of clear-cut chances after going 1-0 up, doubled their lead just before half-time when Murphy burst down the left-hand side and crossed for Anthony Gordon to tap into the net.

Sean Longstaff added a third straight after when he robbed Marc Guehi on the edge of the box and had the simple task of beating Johnstone one-on-one.

Newcastle bagged their fourth in the 67th minute when Murphy sent a long cross along the face of goal for the former Bournemouth striker to score.

Palace had only conceded seven goals in eight games before their trip to St James’ Park.

Hodgson said: “We came here thinking and believing that we could give Newcastle a good game and maybe even make life a little bit difficult for them, but we fell woefully short in that department.

“Our first half was really nowhere near what we have been able to do up until now.

“They are a hard team to defend against. But it didn’t work out. At half-time, we were looking at salvaging something from the game and not going away totally and utterly dejected and because we conceded even more goals than the ones we conceded.

“Nothing really positive to say from our point of view.

“We have to analyse and make certain we work out why a team that has been very, very compact defensively, very strong and made so few errors which have cost us goals, suddenly did so. 

“I thought we were somewhat unfortunate with the first goal – that didn’t help. It was a freak goal. If we had scored it I would have been delighted, but it’s a tough goal to have against you after a few minutes.”