Stockport County - 0
Crystal Palace - 1 (Freedman 87.

Going into this match the last relegation place was still on offer. Grimsby Town ensured that they were not going to fill that spot with a fine win over champions Fulham. Palace needed to equal whatever Portsmouth achieved on the day, or with the same result they could actually "afford" to be one goal worse than whatever Pompey managed. To foil this plan the guys at Fratton Park hammered Barnsley 3-0, and we were looking down the barrel of relegation despite a last gasp winner courtesy of Dougie Freedman. The two goal differential was just one too many, and we would have been relegated as Portsmouth would swap places once again with us. There was still one more important result to come in though, and this was the Huddersfield match. Despite five agonising minutes of added time to our match, during which we managed to survive, the game at the Alfred McAlpine Stadium still had three minutes left to play. Finally lady luck turned our way, and the result remained 1-2, with Birmingham hanging on to their 5th place in the League. Had they but known, Preston had beaten West Brom, and their 5th place was never really in jeopardy; but they certainly saved the day for Palace. To say that Steve Kember has pulled off a miracle would be somewhat understating the facts, and Simon Jordan could do well to consider Steve, and Terry Bullivant, for the job next season.

Although this match officially had only 9,782 listed as its' official attendance, one would be very surprised if this was a true indication of the number of people there. For a start there were 3,000 Palace supporters in the audience, and if Stockport can only muster 6,000+ then they must have a lot of worries making ends meet at the end of each month! I guess it appears to be about correct though, as their ground capacity seems to be limited to a shade under 10,000.

Stockport kicked off in the match and with his first move goalwards Dougie Freedman won a corner for the visitors. As has seemed the case of late though, Palace failed to score from yet another set piece, and this is an area that the new manager will need to look at early in the new season. Gregg Berhalter then defended well, and the ball flew up to the other end, and another corner was won. A mistake by Lee Jones presented Steve Thomson with the perfect opportunity to score, but he failed to connect properly with the ball.

A good chance presented itself to Glynn Hurst who failed to hit the ball with any power, and then Palace raced down the other end to win yet another corner. Once again the chance came to naught, and so the match progressed from end to end.

Clinton Morrison got through on goal, but the keeper was wide-awake to the move, and did well to snuff out any danger. Dean Austin then cleared well, finding Clinton who shot poorly again.

Peter Clark then put a shot over the top for the home side before Dougie put Mikael Forssell through, his shot being ineffectual too. Although we were getting the majority of shots on goal we were having trouble maintaining possession, and the honours were about even, as was the scoreboard.

A shot from Hurst went straight to Alex Kolinko in goal, and though his clearance found Clinton he was unable to find any space in the Stockport defence to work any wonders with the ball. A good chance for Mikael went wide, and then we won another corner. This led to yet another following the goalmouth melee, and this time it was Jamie Smith that took the final shot that the keeper did well to save.

A free kick to Palace found Gregg Berhalter hitting a long-range shot that went straight to the keeper once again. A corner to Stockport was completely missed by Alex, but fortunately the attack was slow to react, and we lived to fight once again.

Before we knew what was happening the referee was signalling half time, and the players trooped off for the usual pep talk from the manager. Just what Steve said to the side will always remain a mystery, but it was later revealed that Dougie told him that he, Dougie, would get a goal in the second half, and being the big occasion player that he is he was as good as his word.

Hayden Mullins had to be alert to clear off the line from another attempt from Hurst, but then he nearly messed it up with a back-heel pass to Alex that very nearly ended up as disaster as the Stockport players raced our keeper for the ball. Alex just won the race, and the Palace faithful once again breathed a sigh of relief. I feel sure that by now many were doing everything they knew to get Palace across the line, and more than a few were not game enough to even watch the action when the ball entered our defensive half.

Yet another corner, this time taken by Thomson, nearly produced the desired result, when Aki Riihilahti saw his shot cleared off the line; then Mikael sent the ball across the face of the goal, but it missed attack and home defenders alike to simply dribble out the other side of the goalmouth to safety. A good run by Dougie saw a cross to Mikael, which once again the young Finnish striker could not connect with, and it was starting to look more and more as if Division Two was knocking on the door.

Our moment seemed to have arrived when Mikael was flattened in the box, but inexplicably the linesman's flag stayed down, and the referee waved play-on. We were certainly going to get no help from the officials it seemed, but even this assumption was to prove, eventually, wrong. A handball by the defence once again brought claims for a penalty from the Palace contingent; once again the appeal was waved away.

Further attempts by Mikael, Dougie and Aki all failed to find the mark, and now time really was running out. A good move by substitute Tommy Black nearly played Dougie into space, but once again the ball rolled to safety. To prove that it was not all one-way traffic Aaron Wilbraham took a snapshot attempt on goal that hit the post and once again bounced safely away.

A shot on the turn by Clinton from only six yards out failed to worry the defence, and we were now into the last five minutes of the match. Dougie hit a shot that appeared, momentarily, to have broken the deadlock, but the ball merely went into the side netting. An apparent handball from David Hopkin, which was also ignored by the referee, was probably the break we were looking for throughout this match. He played the ball down the left side of the pitch, and almost immediately Dougie made a great run down the left before burying the ball superbly into the back of the net to give us a well-deserved lead.

Following the added-on time Palace almost threw the game away when a back-header from Jamie almost caught Alex unaware, but he recovered in time to avert disaster; and we then all endured the agonising wait for the result of the Huddersfield game.

We must all feel a little sorry for the supporters at Huddersfield, who probably went into this final match without much thought of demotion to Division Two, but needless to say all Palace supporters can rejoice that it was them, and not us, that suffered that fate. See you next year Huddersfield, when hopefully you come straight back up again. What am I saying? Next year I hope Palace gain promotion to the Premiership, and thus they will have to wait a little longer before they meet Huddersfield once again, unless the Cup matches pit us against them!

Colin Pryce

Stockport County: Lee Jones, Ali Gibb, Mike Flynn, Rob Clare, Colin Woodthorpe, David Smith (Leo Roget 65), Karim Fradin, Shefki Kuqi, Peter Clark, Aaron Wilbraham, Glynn Hurst (Shane Nicholson 54).

Substitutes not used: Fredrik Bryngelsson, Keith Briggs, Layton Maxwell.

Crystal Palace: Alex Kolinko, Dean Austin, Hayden Mullins, Gregg Berhalter, Jamie Smith, Steve Thomson (Tommy Black 77), Wayne Carlisle (David Hopkin 65), Aki Riihilahti, Mikael Forssell, Clinton Morrison, Dougie Freedman.

Substitutes not used: Matthew Gregg, Sean Hankin, Steve Evans.

Attendance: 9,782

Referee: Mr A Leake (Darwen)