Arsenal legend Emmanuel Petit said Patrick Vieira’s sacking at Crystal Palace was “brutal” and he was told he would be sacked “at 7am on Friday (March 17)”.
The former France midfielder added that his compatriots may be “frustrated” by Steve Parish’s calls to sack him because he has not received enough support in the summer transfer market.
A major problem for Palace is their lack of goals, relying heavily on Wilfried Zaha, as Odsonne Edouard and Jean-Philippe Mateta cannot score 10 goals, let alone themselves.
Crystal Palace have only scored 22 goals this season, and no team has fewer than him, although Wolves, Everton and Nottingham Forest have all scored similar goals.
The problem for Crystal Palace is that all these teams have been fighting relegation for months and they’ve just entered that terrible fight and at the very wrong time.
Still, with Vieira’s last game coming when Crystal Palace lost to bitter rivals Brighton on Wednesday, his former team-mate shared his thoughts on it all, As he told Premier League Productions (1:10pm 19/03/23).
“I feel bad about it,” Pettit said. “I know it’s brutal, especially after I’ve been told how he got the call at 7am on a Friday morning, so I think it’s brutal. That’s it. This is modern football. Patrick knows the rules.
“He knows that after the World Cup, he and his team played very badly. He has to pay the price somewhere. That’s it. Sometimes I can’t understand it. Unfortunately, that’s the reality.
“If I were Patrick, I would be a little frustrated. Last season, they played really well. I think the club will be more active in the transfer market, especially up front.
“If you look at the players. They’ve got good players. But no one has scored more than ten goals in a season. I think that’s a major problem for them. They’ve lost Gallagher too, who It’s the link between the midfield and the strikers. I think they should have been more active in the transfer market.”
Palace is free for everyone
That’s 13 games and zero wins in all competitions. Plus there isn’t a single win in 2023.
If you want a handbook on what it takes to shoot yourself in the foot as a football club, drag yourself into a relegation battle and then possibly relegate when not many expected it, then Crystal Palace are writing it right now.
This international break means a lot to their appointees. Whether it’s Roy “Two Steps Back” Hodgson, or an insider or unknown.
If this continues to go wrong then Crystal Palace are going down and it will all be their own doing.
In other news, Martin Odegaard claims Arteta’s two signings have given Arsenal ‘different ideas’
