Arsenal legend Emmanuel Petit has stated that Patrick Vieira’s sacking at Crystal Palace was ‘brutal’ and he was told that he was being removed from his duties at ‘7 am on Friday (March 17)’.
The former France midfielder added that his fellow countryman is probably ‘frustrated’ at Steve Parish’s call to sack him because he wasn’t backed enough during the summer transfer market.
One major problem for Palace has been their lack of goals, with a heavy reliance on Wilfried Zaha, as Odsonne Edouard and Jean-Philippe Mateta can’t score ten goals between them, never mind for themselves.
Only 22 goals have been scored by Palace this season, no team has scored fewer, although, Wolves, Everton and Nottingham Forest have all scored the same amount.
The issue here for Palace is that all those teams have been in a relegation fight for a number of months, but they have just entered that dreaded fight, and at the very wrong time.
Nonetheless, with Vieira’s last game being Palace’s defeat to bitter rivals Brighton on Wednesday, his former teammate shared his thoughts on it all, as he told Premier League Productions (19/03/23 at 1:10 pm).
“I was sad for that,” said Petit. “I know it’s brutal, especially since I have been told how he received a phone call at 7 in the morning on Friday, so I think it’s brutal. This is how it is. It’s modern football. Patrick knows the rules.
“He knows, straight after the World Cup, it went very badly for him and his team. He has to pay the price somewhere. This is the way it is. I can’t understand that sometimes. This is the reality, unfortunately.
“If I was Patrick, then I would be a little bit frustrated. Last season, they did a really good season. I thought the club would have been more active in the transfer market, especially in front.
“If you look at the players. They have decent players. But no one can score more than ten goals during the season. I think that was a major problem for them. They lost as well Gallagher and he was the link between the midfielders and the strikers. I think they should have been more active in the transfer market.”
PALACE ARE IN FREE FOR ALL
That’s 13 games in all competitions and zero wins. Plus not a single win in 2023.
If you ever want a manual on how to shoot yourselves in the foot as a football club, drag yourself into a relegation battle, and then possibly get relegated when not many expect it, then Palace are writing just that right now.
This International break is going to be huge in who they appoint. Whether it’s Roy ‘taking two backwards steps’ Hodgson, someone from within or an unknown figure.
If this continues to go wrong, then Palace are heading down and it will all be their own doing.
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