Crystal Palace - 4 (Svensson 20. Carlisle 59. Fan 63. Mullins 90.)
Portsmouth - 0

Following on from our recent run of avoiding defeat, we were looking to this match to make a significant movement up the table. The team did not disappoint us. The press made a lot of the fact that Portsmouth had only won once at Selhurst Park in the last 33 years, but that is not such an important statistic when it is considered that the "once" they were referring to was only three years ago!

As soon as the match was underway it was fairly obvious that Palace were the more dominant of the two teams. Following a couple of chances that were wasted by Matthias Svensson and Lee Bradbury, it was the same two players that combined to produce our opening goal. Lee made the goal out on the left before sending in an inch perfect pass to Matthias who had no difficulty putting the ball around keeper Andy Petterson, and into the back of the net. Another chance to Lee went astray, and then Andy Linighan hit the crossbar with the keeper nowhere in sight.

It took until 10 minutes before the end of the first half for Pompey to even get a look at our goal, when Andy McLoughlin took a shot from fully 20 yards out. This caused the defence no problems whatsoever, but probably gave the crowd a bit of a scare. A one goal lead, and our record of conceding a goal towards the end of any period, is enough to worry even the most stalwart Palace supporter.

The second half appeared to be shaping up as more of the same, so the only real surprise was that the crowd had to wait for almost 15 minutes before they could all let out a collective sigh of relief. A good move on the Portsmouth goal saw the defence failing to clear the danger, leaving Steve Thomson the easy task of feeding the ball to Wayne Carlisle. Though he was also 20 yards out from goal his effort never looked like missing, his first senior goal impressively hitting the back of the net. Here's hoping that there are many more to come from him.

2-0 up, were Palace going to once again take their foot off the pedal?

Definitely not!

Having scored his first goal Wayne was instrumental in making the next goal to give Palace an "unbeatable" lead. Making space for himself he managed to send in a great cross which Fan Zhiyi got his head to. On a day where very little could go wrong for the team the ball flew into the back of the net, and we were 3 up.

Portsmouth were, by now, well and truly out of the match, so it was little surprise when in the dying moments of the game Lee put in another good cross, which this time was met by Hayden Mullins with another fine header to put the icing on the cake.

A vastly improved performance from the team saw us climb up the table, and a few more results like this will see us back up where we belong, pushing for a promotion spot.

Colin Pryce

Crystal Palace: Fraser Digby, Jamie Smith (David Woozley 82), Andy Linighan, Fan Zhiyi (Fernando Der Ornelas 80), Dean Austin, Wayne Carlisle, Steve Thomson, Hayden Mullins, Jamie Fullarton (Andrew Frampton 64), Lee Bradbury, Matthias Svensson.

Substitutes not used: Matthew Gregg, Chris Sharpling.

Portsmouth: Andy Petterson, Matthew Robinson, Andy Awford, Adrian Whitbread, Fitzroy Simpson, Thomas Thorgersen, Alan McLoughlin, Michael Panopoulos, Jeff Peron (Stefani Miglioranzi 60), Guy Whittingham (Steve Claridge 60), Luke Nightingale.

Substitutes not used: Michalis Vlachos, Aaron Flahavan, John Durnin.

Attendance: 15,221

Referee: Mr K Leach (Codsall).