Roy Hodgson has asked Crystal Palace supporters who accused the club’s owners of lacking of ambition to be “careful”, in the leadup to the derby with Brighton on Monday night.
Following defeats against Leeds and Burnley and given growing uncertainty over Hodgson’s future, a banner urging Palace to “restore the pride, ambition and vision” was displayed briefly outside the training ground in Beckenham last week. The former England manager’s contract is due to expire at the end of the season and Hodgson said he has yet to discuss a renewal with the club’s chairman, Steve Parish.
With 14 players also out of contract in the summer, the 73-year-old – who will celebrate his 50th wedding anniversary this year – denied that the uncertainty was having a detrimental effect on results.
“I’m more than happy to carry on as we are at the moment and let the time pass,” he said. “I don’t have any strong feelings at the moment on that subject – we’ll see what transpires. That’s the way I would like it to be. We have to make certain that we don’t allow anything like that impacts on the way we play. It’s certainly not impacting me or the way I’m preparing for a game and I would like to think that the same applies to the players, although I can’t speak for them individually.”
Brighton could move above their rivals with victory at the Amex Stadium, with Palace missing Wilfried Zaha again as he recovers from a hamstring injury. Yet a win for the away side would mean Palace have amassed more points at this stage of the season than during any other previous Premier League campaign and Hodgson cited the example of another local rivalry as even more reason for prudence over the coming months.
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“People need to be careful,” he said. “When Alan Curbishley left Charlton many years ago, they were constantly in the top half of the table, it was because fans were not happy and thought that finishing in the top half wasn’t enough and that they needed to kick on. They did, they kicked downwards and that is the only problem. You have to be careful.
“This is part and parcel of our football life. As a manager and coach or player you’re going to be criticised for performances and people are going to read into things from performances that are not always there. Personally I think it is not a bad achievement for a team that has actually spent not very much money and has worked within a reasonable budget to be in the league every year.”