STOKE SOB STORY!
Relegated Lambert moans: This club has been sleepwalking into trouble
EVEN the watching World Cup winning hero and famed Potter Gordon Banks wouldn’t have been able to save Stoke from their relegation fate.
The great man, like just about everyone else of a Stoke persuasion, was head bowed in the stand fighting off the tears as Crystal Palace struck twice late on to end the club’s 10-year tenure in the top flight.
It had been so different when, with Stoke 1-0 up and intent on defying the odds, manager Paul Lambert brought off Peter Crouch to a standing ovation.
Crouch had been his normal nuisance self, roughing up anyone brave enough to come into his vicinity.
Within two minutes Stoke’s softness at the other end of the pitch was exposed with traumatic consequences.
Palace’s roadrunner Wilfried Zaha found Ruben Loftus-cheek and the Chelsea loanee fed James Mcarthur, whose crisp finish eluded Jack Butland.
Worse was to follow in the 86th minute as Ryan Shawcross could only divert an attempted clearance straight to Patrick van Aanholt, who fired low past Butland. The England keeper looked inconsolable at the reality of it all.
Cue a mass exodus of Stoke fans in the knowledge that the game was up, barely enough to witness the players’ walk of shame following the final whistle.
Lambert admitted: “The season starts in July, August and if you start badly then you usually find yourself in trouble. For too long the club has been sleepwalking. I am gutted for everyone. But I believe the club will be rebuilt stronger. “The players have been too anxious, worried about what was going to happen.” Any euphoria from a brilliant 42nd-minute Xherdan Shaqiri freekick had been punctured quicker than you could say Tony Pulis. Yes, Pulis who consistently kept Stoke in the Premier League but who eventually was axed because many fans were fed up with what they deemed sterile football. The majority will deem, this morning, it is better than traipsing around in the Championship. Mark Hughes came and went and it is Lambert who will now have Stoke’s relegation on his CV after picking up just one win in 14 games.
For his Palace counterpart life couldn’t be better as Roy Hodgson (left) chases a top-10 finish, having seen them become the first club since Liverpool in 1900 to avoid relegation after losing their first seven games.
But he said: “I think all of us who are going to survive this year will have empathy that we were fortunate that we stayed up and others didn’t.
“Paul Lambert said to come and have a drink. But it’s a hard one because you don’t know what to say.”
Even a rousing rendition of the Stoke anthem ‘Delilah’ by a packed bet365 Stadium prior to the kick-off couldn’t disguise the anguish which was to inevitably follow.
Tom Jones would have been proud but sadly once again Lambert’s players failed to find their voice.
Lambert had been like a caged tiger in his technical area, kicking and heading every ball in a game which in his own words was “all or nothing”.
Shaqiri produced a lifeline just before the break. The Swiss weaved his way towards the danger area only for Loftus-cheek to bring him down.
The execution of the free-kick by Shaqiri under choking pressure was perfect and too good for Palace keeper Wayne Hennessey, a slight deflection off Loftus-cheek taking his eighth Premier League goal of the season into the top corner.
Shaqiri raced towards his manager, jumping into his arms as the Stoke bench went berserk.
But they never looked like building on their advantage as Palace grew in stature and carved out a succession of chances before turning the screw.
So for Palace and their fans it was party time – for Stoke a relegation wake.