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Wilfried Zaha has been a talisman for Crystal Palace. He has been their go-to man, and they have built a squad around his best skills. But that could have been different if they had accepted the €40million bid from Arsenal in 2019.

Why did they not accept it? Why did they prioritise keeping Zaha? And do they have a similar conundrum on the horizon?

Jon Mackenzie explains. Craig Silcock illustrates.

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47 Comments

  1. I'm speaking for every Palace fan here – Zaha's worth to our club is more than any dollar-value transfer. He's been our talisman for the better part of 10 years, and has played a key part in keeping us up. I truly hope we manage to get him to sign an extension, because regardless of how old he is, we're going to struggle the second he leaves us. Not only that, but the 25% sell-on clause to Manchester United is something to seriously consider. In recent years we've invested super wisely. Eze, Guehi, Olise, Anderson are all fantastic players for us and will play a part in trying to push us up the ladder slowly but surely. I just pray we actually decide on an ambition rather than sell these players to bigger clubs for profit.

  2. Mind you, no matter how well their recruitment performs they won't chase any title since there are more compact teams with much better managers. The issue in my opinion is not ending up 6th in a league. Entirely possible if they have an entire year of great form next year. The issue is that their aspiring stars will get taken by teams with bigger budgets as soon as possible and that leaves the team in this entire cycle of JUST participating. If they are JUST going to participate in the League like many other teams not going through relegation woes or chasing titles. I think it makes sense to keep your best players until the value is low.

  3. As a Palace fan it was clear keeping him in 2019 was the right decision. He practically carried the team on his shoulders for a couple of years and I strongly believe if we'd sold him we'd have been relegated.

    However, should we keep him now? I would say no. At some point, we're going to have to redistribute the wage bill to reward the younger players we have – Guehi, Eze and Olise. These are the players we need to keep. If letting Zaha go now on a free transfer frees up some of the wage bill to allow for this redistribution and we can find a younger player or two from either our outstanding academy team or externally to replace Zaha then that is what I believe we should do.

    Don't get me wrong. Zaha has been a talismanic figure for Palace for over 10 years. As I said he practically singlehandedly kept us up. He'll always be a club legend. It's just the time for him to go has probably come.

  4. It’s videos like this that demonstrates how little Tifo actually knows about the sport.

  5. Weird video tbh. Akin to SunnyV2, Tifo has almost become a content farm at this point.

  6. This season Palace played better when Zaha wasn’t available, so I think they’ll be fine after he leaves on a free this summer. And in general, I like to see smallish clubs keep good players rather than automatically selling every good player to one of the rich clubs.

  7. Pretty bad video compared to your usually high standards (although not in terms of the editing/voice over/animation). Why fixate on the fee that Arsenal paid for a different player, a fee which was never offered to Palace? Why not mention the 25% sell on clause to Man U? Maybe i'm being harsh as a Palace fan it's rare a channel like this does content focused on us, so i'm just disappointed it wasn't better..

  8. What do you mean by ā€œachieved a better demographic profileā€?

  9. Palace better without him. He is a pre Madonna and eze and olise play better without him demanding the ball every single attack

  10. Thanks for covering the club I support! I don’t think we ā€œhadā€ to let those experienced players go. It was a choice, and the club had planned for it in advance. It’s fair to say that the players we signed that summer after the clear out are easily some of the best players at the club right now. For me personally, I’m happy we kept Zaha. The only regret is that we didn’t sign Gallagher rather than loan him. Maybe this summer we have another go at bringing him back!

  11. Keeping Zaha at Crystal Palace has been mutually beneficial for both player and club: The former is guarenteed playing time, and has prospered with his goal scoring record, the latter likewise has maintained their position in the top tier of English football and could challenge for better positions (i.e. European slots) in successive seasons. There are plenty of examples of clubs that have fallen apart after selling their star player (e.g. Leeds and Kalvin Philips) and more where that star player has struggled to make it into a different squad, for whatever reason or another (e.g. Danny Drinkwater at Chelsea).

  12. The only scenario in which I think it would have made sense for Palace to sell Zaha would have been if he downed tools.

  13. As an American, I couldn't name a single Palace player besides Zaha (until recently, Eze and Olise are now big prospects). It goes to show how important he's been to that club for YEARS. He's their franchise player. They shouldn't sell Olise or Guehi either. Keep investing the money they get from staying in the prem into other young talents to add to what they have. Zaha (and Eze/Olise) will keep them in the prem long enough to find a European-level squad.

  14. I think they as a club have benefited greatly from his presence. He should have perhaps kicked up a fuss to get a move sooner. He is a player that could (should) be playing champions league football not worrying about premier league survival. I think he’d do well at a Atletico Madrid or perhaps AC Milan. Maybe by moving to one of the two aforementioned clubs he’d earn less money, but this a talent that deserves to be showcased on a Wednesday evening somewhere! Let’s be honest, I am sure he isn’t struggling for cash.

  15. I'd say Zaha is the sole reason why Crystal Palace stayed in the Premier League all those years. Were Palace to sell their best players every year, chances were likely they would end up like Southampton at some point.

  16. In these scenarios I would almost always favour keeping a good player and letting them go on a free. The risk to replace a proven quality player is just too high to justify msot transfer fees, compared with the earnings from staying in the league.

  17. I still don’t understand why in this day and age wages aren’t mentioned when calculating a player’s value. It is a known fact now that doing the accounting for a football club that the player amortisation is a linear calculation of transfer fee + wages over the length of the contract.

  18. I feel like you have to try to get better every year. As a club you cant just have a goal of avoid relegation. You have to take risks. Look at brighton, clearly you can sell high and recruit low value players with high potential without the promise of european football. Just the prospect of playing in the prem is enough for many young talents. Look to build, like leicter city. There are so many examples

  19. 100% agree – you only have to look at Southampton who have a much better youth academy than us, yet they sold the majority of those players and where are they next season?

  20. Dann and Cahill were both very old – when they left they both signed for lower league clubs. So I don't think that was a huge loss.

  21. How much of the ball does Zaha need to be effective? Like really, how many shots, dribbles etc is he allowed, and where else would he be allowed to play with the freedom he does at Palace? Anyone got some stats to back that?

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