Until Roy Hodgson arrived late-on and steadied the ship, Crystal Palace were in a bad place this term and many even had the Eagles as relegation favourites in Premier League predictions.
As Patrick Vieira’s two-year tenure at Selhurst Park spluttered to an end, the Eagles could only produce unadventurous fare, an absence of attacking intent that was not only reflected in their results but a notable lack of goals scored.
In Vieira’s last 15 games in charge, his team found the back of the net a meagre seven times.
According to the Premier League betting, Palace were in grave danger of dropping and what made their situation all the more frustrating was acknowledging the impressive wealth of talent they possessed when going forward.
Wilfried Zaha had long been Palace’s creative totem, a sublimely gifted winger who has the ability to churn a full-back’s blood with one drop of his shoulder.
Since joining from Reading, having won the EFL Young Player of the Season, Michael Olise has been a revelation. Then there’s Eberechi Eze, the former boy wonder who seemed destined for greatness until serious injury put his inevitable coronation on hold.
The manner in which the 24-year-old glides across the pitch with the ball at his feet is worth the entrance fee alone.
To have such an arsenal of genuine threats, yet still look lacklustre, is damning on Vieira and then when things got particularly sticky, the French manager lost any last remaining faith he had in flair and its rewards, demoting Eze to the bench from mid-January to mid-March.
That’s when Palace’s problems really got bad.
Enter Hodgson, a man associated with footballing conservatism but also shrewd and seasoned enough to realise that Palace’s best hope lay in shaking off their torpor and furthermore he had the players to do just that.
On Eze’s return, at home to Leicester, he out-performed James Maddison, performing the same role for the opposition, as Palace racked up an astonishing 31 attempts on goal. From that point on, there was no stopping him.
It was a special Premier League season for Eberechi Eze 📈#CPFC pic.twitter.com/A1qt7ID5RS
— PFF FC (@PFF_FC) June 7, 2023
As his side cocked a snook to the football odds and pulled away from a desperate group of strugglers, Eze scored six in his next seven starts, assisting for good measure in the game that followed.
He was brilliant. Transformed. Everywhere.
In his own words, the attacking midfielder was ‘at peace’ as he tormented back-tracking foes, who were too scared to commit and too hesitant to react to his fast-paced slaloming.
So impactful was the player who first exhibited his excellence at QPR in the Championship that he was duly handed an England call-up by Gareth Southgate for the Three Lions’ forthcoming fixtures against Malta and North Macedonia and the story behind his international recognition warms the heart.
Because in the summer of 2021, after dazzling in his opening campaign for Palace, Eze ruptured an Achilles tendon in training, an injury so serious it reduced some team-mates to tears.
Helped back to the changing room, the bereft player turned on his phone to inform friends and relatives of his misfortune only to discover a text confirming he had been picked for England’s next squad.
On that occasion, his superstardom was curtailed. But you cannot keep a sensational talent like Eberechi Eze down for long.
*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to AP Photo*
