Chapter 884 - 884: Tuesday Night

Michael Steele went to Croydon on the Wednesday after that, on his own, on an afternoon off. He has not told me what happened and I have not asked.

Rebecca gave me a card on the Friday morning with a number on it.

3.

"That is your substitutions. Not the rules, me. On Tuesday you play Internazionale, and this morning I have got 6 men who have flown more than 4,000 miles in 9 days."

"And the 3?"

"Wilf for 25 minutes and Christian for 25 minutes. That is 2 of them, and the 3rd is yours. Perišić, Neves and Achraf are not in the 18 and I am not discussing that part."

"And if we are losing?"

"Then you are losing," Rebecca said, "and on Tuesday night you are not."

So I made 7 changes for a match I could not afford to lose.

CRYSTAL PALACE: Pope. Ward, Dann, Tuanzebe, Mitchell. Rodríguez, McArthur, Kirby. Townsend, Blake, Grealish.

Bench: Krul, Sakho, Chilwell, Højbjerg, Olise, Zaha, Benteke.

Jack Grealish started a league match for the first time since the 11th of August, 4 days after Marcus told me in a corridor that he was the only answer in the building, and Connor Blake led the line for the team top of the Premier League because he has scored in every session Bray has run since the 3rd. Scott Dann took the armband for the first time since May. Rodríguez played a Saturday at Huddersfield 4 days after flying back from Bogotá, and he asked to.

24,121 in a ground that holds 24,500, all of them on their feet for 90 minutes, because Huddersfield Town have 1 point and knew exactly what we were. David Wagner played 5 at the back and pressed in bursts of about 6 minutes, which is the correct way to play us and the most exhausting thing in football.

0-0 at half time and it was the worst half we have played all season. Pope made 2 saves. Nya Kirby took it off Aaron Mooy twice inside the first quarter of an hour and spent the rest of the half being doubled up on for his trouble. Connor Blake had 11 touches and 6 of them were headers against a man 5 inches taller. Grealish was fouled 5 times and got up 5 times.

I stood in that dressing room with Zaha and Benteke sat in front of me in tracksuits and a card in my pocket with the number 3 on it, and nobody said anything for about 20 seconds.

"Gaffer." Scott Dann, boots off, cut above his eye. "Give them the answer before they ask it, because they will all be looking at that bench in 10 minutes."

"Which answer?"

"Whether you are putting them on."

"No."

Tk. Somebody put a bottle down.

"I will tell you what happens if I do. Wilf and Christian go on at 46, we probably win this 2-0, everybody goes home happy, and on Tuesday night 2 of my 3 best players have got 45 extra minutes in their legs against Internazionale. We have won 4 out of 4. I am not spending the 18th of September to make this afternoon easier."

"So it is on us," Rodríguez said.

"It is on the 11 of you until 68. I have got 3 and I am using all 3 at 68, and 2 of them are the 25 minutes I am allowed."

"And if it is still 0-0 at 68?"

"Then I put 2 men on who will be tired on Tuesday, and I will do it, and I will not enjoy it."

Connor Blake put his hand up, and 6 senior professionals turned round, and none of them said anything, because in this dressing room a hand up means somebody has seen something.

"Go on, Connor."

"I have had 11 touches and 6 of them were headers I lost."

"I know."

"They are playing a back 5 and Kongolo steps across every time the ball goes wide, and I keep going near post, because that is where I am supposed to be. It is not working." He had his elbows on his knees. "If James can find the far side of him I will get there. He has stepped across 9 times and he has not looked behind him once."

Rodríguez turned his head.

"Say that again."

"He has not looked behind him once."

"Boss." Rodríguez had both hands flat on his knees. "I did not see that, and I have been looking at him for 45 minutes."

"Then it is a good job somebody else was."

Rebecca got me at the door on the way back out.

"That was a proper half time."

"It was Blake's half time."

"I know. I was stood behind you."

53 minutes. Grealish went past Hadergjonaj and hit the side netting, and 24,000 people made a noise like a bus going past.

58 minutes. Grealish took it 30 yards inside his own half with Mooy and Hogg both coming, and he did the thing Marcus had a number for. He waited for the second one, got his body across, and rolled it square instead of going down.

James Rodríguez, 27 years old, 2 World Cups, 5,000 miles on the Tuesday, played the pass nobody else on that pitch could see. 40 yards, first time, off the outside of his right foot, over a back 5 and into the 4 yards of grass between Kongolo and the goalkeeper.

Connor Blake was running before it left his boot.

shhk.

He got there a stride before Jonas Lössl, and he did not panic and he did not try to lift it. He put his laces through it from 9 yards and it went under the goalkeeper and in off the far post.

Dnk. 0-1.

Blake got about 15 yards and stopped and put both hands on top of his own head. Rodríguez got to him first, took hold of the back of his neck and said something into the side of his face. 3,000 people behind that goal were singing the name of a boy this club let go in 2016, and he had told them at half time exactly how it was going to happen.

On the bench Ellis Cartwright was up with both arms above his head.

"CONNOR BLAKE. CONNOR BLAKE."

I used all 3 at 68. Zaha for Townsend, Benteke for Blake, Olise for Kirby. Blake came off to 3,000 people on their feet and shook my hand at the white line and did not say a word.

79 minutes. Michael Olise went outside Kongolo, then inside him, then hit it with his left from 19 yards into the top corner.

Huddersfield Town 0 Crystal Palace 2.

Ellis Cartwright sat on that bench for 90 minutes and did not get on. He was the first man off it when the goal went in and the last one to sit back down.

On the coach he sat 3 rows from the front on his own, the way he always does, and Connor Blake went and sat next to him, and neither of them said anything for about 20 minutes. Then they talked for an hour and a half and I could not hear a word of it.

Both of those names are on Sarah's sheet of 40. Michael Cooke released Connor Blake in the summer of 2016 and Ellis Cartwright in the June just gone, and this football club signed both of them back, and on Saturday afternoon 1 of them scored and the other one was the loudest man on that bench when he did it.

Ron will reach the pair of them some time in October, on a Wednesday, with a flask on the desk, and find out they are 40 yards down the corridor.

P5 W5. 14 scored, 1 conceded, 15 points.

Manchester City beat Fulham 3-0 and went a goal ahead of us on difference, and Marcus had the table up on the coach before we cleared the town.

"Take it down," Sarah said.

"We are 2nd."

"We are 2nd, and City are top on Wednesday morning whatever happens on Tuesday night, because Tuesday night is not a league match." She did not look up from the folder. "There is nothing on that screen that helps anybody on this coach. Tuesday does."

Marcus took it down.

We were back at Beckenham at 20 to 9, and there were 4 television vans on Copers Cope Road, and Ron was on that barrier in his own coat 3 hours after he should have gone home.

Crystal Palace were founded in 1905. In 113 years this club has never played a match in the European Cup. Not a group match, not a qualifier, not a preliminary round in any year you care to name.

On Tuesday night at 8 o'clock, at Wembley, Internazionale.

Luciano Spalletti has taken Roma to 2 quarter finals of this competition, and he has Mauro Icardi, who scored 29 in Serie A last season, and Radja Nainggolan, who cost 38 million euros in June. And Ivan Perišić, who played 3 seasons in that shirt and still owns a house in Milan, told me on the 30th of August exactly how much of himself he could promise me.

Sarah had 1 line left and she had been holding onto it since Thursday.

"Inter have named 22."

"And?"

"Asamoah is not in it," she said. "Nainggolan is."