PRE-SEASON FRIENDLY – BROMLEY 3 – 0 CRYSTAL PALACE: MATCH REPORT
What on Earth did I just witness!? Pierre Sage will hopefully be more upset than I am with the showing today, as his side loses for the first time in his tenure to no less than League 1 side Bromley.
FIRST HALF
First Half XI: Benitez (GK), Canvot, Walker-Smith, Adaramola, Cardines, Devenny, Hughes, Benamar, Esse, França, Rak-Sakyi
Pierre Sage once again chose a separate eleven for each half, continuing his exploration of the squad.
The first half proved frustrating for the Eagles, as they saw less of the ball than they would’ve wanted, and squandered chances left and right. Matheus França was a key culprit in the frankly infuriating inadequacy in front of goal, wasting two key chances throughout the half.
Jesurun Rak-Sakyi was similarly ineffective, and just to complete the trio, Romain Esse barely found an opportunity to waste during his time on the pitch.
Jaydee Canvot proved to be a bright spot, being defensively solid and carrying the ball forward often later in the half, creating opportunities to attack – opportunities which the Palace forwards subsequently didn’t know what to do with.
Palace went into the half frustrated, but with the game tied at 0-0, there was little reason to panic.
SECOND HALF
Second Half XI: Whitworth (GK), King, Jemide, Sosa, Imray, Ozoh, Doucouré, Mitchell, Drakes-Thomas, Nketiah, Johnson
Good grief.
Neither side looked particularly convincing in the first ten minutes of the second 45, but Palace especially looked woefully underwhelming. The home side found the breakthrough on the 62nd minute through Victor Adeboyejo; a defensive error from Mofe Jemide gave the Nigerian a golden opportunity, which he was all too happy to take.
Down but not out, Palace kept pushing, finding chance after chance, but never quite finding the goal. The best chance came on the 68th minute; a sliding Eddie Nketiah cross from the right hand side found Joél Drakes-Thomas unmarked at the back post with the goal at his mercy, only for the 17-year-old to hook it wide.
Bromley would be handed another golden opportunity, as Palace conceded a clumsy penalty, after some sloppy passing in the midfield. Adeboyejo stepped up and doubled his team’s advantage.
Palace continued to threaten, but were consistently thwarted by a combination of their own hopefully-temporary allergy to the goal, and an admittedly solid defensive performance from Bromley. This is a good time to congratulate Bromley on a job well done, as they played did play well across the 90 minutes.
Towards the end of those 90 minutes, Bromley would put the final nail in the coffin. A looping cross from the left hand side of the penalty area found the head of Nicke Kabamba, who headed it back across goal and over the line.
If we were to pick out every player on the pitch for analysis, we’d be here forever, but let’s look at just a couple.
Joél Drakes-Thomas, while unable to score, showed consistent determination to run at his defender, displaying the kind of chutzpah that any young player needs to break into the first team. Brennan Johnson’s performance, on the other hand, had fans wondering if and when we would ever see a player worth even half the money we paid for him.
CONCLUSION
23 shots, 8 on target – no goals. 5 big chances created – 5 big chances wasted. This kind of showing feels eerily similar to some matches in recent seasons, where an abundance of quality chances has not translated to an abundance of goals. I desperately hope that this is something that Pierre Sage will address going forward.
*all photographs sourced from cpfc.co.uk
