Ward: We let Sunderland play – that’s unacceptable
Crystal Palace defender Joel Ward admits that his side’s performance against Sunderland was “unacceptable”.
The Eagles slipped to second-bottom spot in the table, only above bottom club Sunderland on goal difference after crashing to a 4-0 home defeat to the Wearsiders on Saturday.
The visitors stormed four goals up by the interval as Palace were blown away, failing miserably to build on last Tuesday’s impressive 2-0 triumph at Bournemouth.
Lamine Kone’s well-taken opening goal for the Black Cats was followed by Didier Ndong’s excellent strike from distance and a pair of clinical finishes from Jermain Defoe, as Sunderland avenged a 3-2 home defeat to the Londoners.
“It’s extremely frustrating,” confessed former Portsmouth player Ward.
“First half, I think they outworked us and we let them play, let them pick up the ball in dangerous areas and didn’t cope with what they threw at us. “That’s unacceptable. “We wanted to come in to the game with the momentum from Bournemouth the other night, but we didn’t do that and by the time we did it was too late.
“If you get the first goal it’s a massive boost for the side, but we didn’t get it.
“Then we made it too easy for them to get their noses in front and gifted them too many goals.
“We have to get together, dust ourselves off, roll up our sleeves and go – if we don’t do that we’re going to be in very big trouble.
“We need to come off the ropes swinging – and that’s just the start of it.”