If there was a summer transfer that just about seemed to suit all parties last summer, it was Eberechi Eze’s move to Arsenal. The player himself let it all work out, returning to the club where it all began and the adoring masses who were waiting for him. Arsenal, meanwhile, got to give their fans the new signing they most wanted and add a little more creativity to Mikel Arteta’s side. Bar the obvious $90 million transfer fee, Crystal Palace’s return was a little more nebulous, though they were at least proving to the next up and coming star of the EFL that, when the time came to move on, this was not a club that would hold them against their will.
What Palace could not have expected was that in losing their best player is that their attack would take an almighty leap forward to be the Premier League’s most deadly force in terms of expected goals (xG). After all, it is not as if Eze was a millstone around this team’s neck before he went from south to north. As befitting his status as the best player on the team, he took a lot of shots but he created plenty for others too, leading the team in assists and chances created while ranking second only to Ismaila Sarr in expected assists (xA).
Eze was Selhurst Park’s hero, the man to deliver in big moments, none more so than the FA Cup Final, where his goal delivered Palace their first piece of major silverware. These are the sorts of players whose absence should feel like a profound rupture in a team’s character. Eze was more important and perhaps even better for Palace than Michael Olise and Oliver Glasner had spent months of last season searching for something like his old team.
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There was never going to be one player who could replace Eze, certainly not at the price points Palace shop at. Instead, what Glasner has managed to do is upgrade upon him in the aggregate. It helps that the one player who they did spend on after their big sale has been yet another hit from one of the Premier League’s outstanding recruitment departments. Yeremy Pino has swiftly adapted to life in England after leaving Villarreal, understanding that, “with technical quality, you can survive the pace of the game in England,” as he told The Athletic.
He brings an approximation of the ball-carrying that Palace lost, averaging the most take ons of anyone in his team so far this season, and he also seems to indulge Eze’s proclivity for shots from range. That might not be the worst habit to unlearn and it is one that his running mate Ismaila Sarr, who has taken all his shots from inside the penalty area, has managed. These two have already proven to be an effective partnership, one taking the lead on ball progression, the other on final third output.
Sarr’s creative numbers have notably dipped this season and perhaps that is nothing more than the effects of a small sample size. Even if it is something more serious, the downswing in chances for others is being more than mitigated by what he is doing in front of goal. The 27-year-old is taking fewer shots but much better ones, his xG per 90 Premier League minutes rocketing from 0.36 to 0.55. Combine that with an xA of 0.05 and he is still giving Palace a fraction more than last season’s 0.58 xG+xA.
In terms of chance creation, it is Adam Wharton who has stepped up, his 1.69 xA the fifth best mark in the Premier League this season, trailing the freight train down the Palace right that is Daniel Munoz. Wharton hasn’t registered an assist this season but he is creating chances by the boatload, particularly from set pieces, where he has the league’s most xA and Palace have the league’s most xG.
We haven’t even got to the best part yet. Jean-Phillipe Mateta has long since established himself as a very good player for the sort of level Palace have historically occupied. Now, well, he looks like a very good player for the sort of level Palace could occupy if this all goes as well as it might. He is comfortably a Champions League standard striker, the only forward in the top flight to keep pace with Erling Haaland in terms of xG, no wonder when he smashed all sorts of records in an 11 shot hat trick game that somehow came to be defined by the guilt edge chance he missed.
Beloved by Palace fans for his booming celebrations and relentless work rate, Mateta has got plenty of flowers in recent weeks and rightly so. He, however, would suggest they are sent on to another address. “I think it’s on him,” Mateta said of Glasner. “He used to train in Germany, and when he came in, [in terms of] how we need to play, I think I understood, because I’m from the German league too.
“I think it’s because I play many games in the role. I think that’s why people say I’m improving my hold-up play — because I know it very well now. I train hard every day, and I want to play every game and show him I’m ready for him, for the team, for the staff. I show them that I want to play every game.
“I think it’s not only me personally, but we have a fantastic team that believes in everyone. We’re just training very hard and believing in ourselves, and on the pitch we’ve had the results.”
Those results are plain to see. Palace’s 17.38 xG is nearly two more than anyone else in the division. Combine that with a league average defense in terms of xG allowed and you have a recipe for a top three expected points tally in the division.
As such the table might not entirely reflect just how good Palace are right now. They’ve conceded fewer goals than the average side might have from the shots they have faced — Dean Henderson’s qualities continue to be under-appreciated outside SE25 — but they have scored far fewer with just 12 to their name. That probably will not last, not for players as good as Sarr, Pino and Mateta.
When that day comes and it all works out, Palace promise to be a match for anyone, even the league leaders with their former superstar in the mix.
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