Sunderland left in trouble by Yannick Bolasie’s Crystal Palace hat-trickSunderland 1 - 4 C PalaceConnor Wickham 90
Glenn Murray 48
Yannick Bolasie 51
Yannick Bolasie 53
Yannick Bolasie 62
Crystal Palace's Yannick Bolasie scores their second goal against Sunderland in the Premier League
The last time Alan Pardew faced Sunderland he ended the afternoon ashen faced and speaking of deep hurt. It was late December and a fourth straight defeat against his then north-east neighbours quite possibly influenced the then Newcastle United manager’s decision to defect to Crystal Palace in the new year.
Pardew’s Palace gameplan was devised with revenge in mind but even he could not have dared to dream it would provide him with such a near-perfect second half. Thanks to a hat-trick from the fabulous Yannick Bolasie, Palace’s ascent of the table continued as a thoroughly chastened Sunderland were reminded that their latest skirmish with relegation is far from over.
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Well before the end the ground had largely emptied but those who remained to the bitter end booed Dick Advocaat’s side off at the end of a game which had begun deceptively brightly.
The first choruses of “Lee, Lee Cattermole,” came shortly after kick-off. Fresh from thoroughly subduing Moussa Sissoko in last Sunday’s 1-0 win against Newcastle United here, Lee Cattermole was once again scything into tackles and calibrating Sunderland’s passing.
Advocaat’s side were clearly benefiting from their new manager’s decision to liberate Cattermole from the extremely deep sitting, quasi sweeping role he had filled under Gus Poyet. Good as he was in that job, Sunderland’s best player is much more effective now he has been offered licence to surge into opposition territory once more.
If only he was a little more disciplined at times Cattermole would surely be in the England squad. This enduring flaw in his make-up dictated it was no surprise when, partway through the first half, he collected his latest yellow card for pulling Bolasie back after Palace’s increasingly influential attacking midfielder had succeeded in dispossessing him.
It was no coincidence that Cattermole needing to watch his step coincided with a marked improvement on Palace’s part. Indeed, that booking arguably proved pivotal to the home team’s subsequent collapse. Advocaat certainly had reason to be grateful that, a little earlier, the referee had looked leniently on Jack Rodwell when he lunged in on James McArthur. It was potentially a red card but Anthony Taylor opted for yellow, thereby allowing one of the better games to have taken place at the Stadium of Light for some time – to put things in context there have been some real shockers in recent months – to unfold in intriguingly absorbing fashion.
Yet despite some fine attacking approach play from Palace’s Bolasie and Jason Puncheon as well as Sunderland’s Connor Wickham – a real menace on the left of Advocaat’s front three – neither goalkeeper was exactly over-stretched during a first half much more about clever containment than penalty-area precision.
If the game’s flow was hardly helped by far too many niggly fouls there were several excellent defensive cameos. With Palace doing an excellent job of isolating Jermain Defoe, 43 minutes had passed before Julián Speroni was required to save the afternoon’s first shot on target – a Steven Fletcher volley unleashed following Patrick van Aanholt’s fine cross.
Although his backline were frequently pulled this way and that by Bolasie and Puncheon and assorted visiting shots were variously blocked and cleared, Costel Pantilimon’s most notable first-half moment saw the home goalkeeper receive a bloody nose after Scott Dann went in rather over exuberantly on him.
Pantilimon’s next moment in the spotlight featured the Romanian picking the ball out of the back of the net early in the second half after he was beaten by Glenn Murray’s header in the wake of a Bolasie cross being deflected to the far post.
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With the previously outstanding John O’Shea suddenly succumbing to some alarming wobbles, Sunderland appeared to have regressed to their old, pre-Advocaat selves during the interval.
They fell further behind when Murray flicked on a long diagonal pass and Bolasie squeezed a shot beneath Pantilimon and their surrender seemed complete when another punt forward concluded with the DR Congo international holding off O’Shea before showing off stellar technique in chipping the ball over the keeper.
The Ireland centre-half’s misery deepened when Murray bullied him out of possession, permitting Bolasie to round Pantilimon and complete a richly deserved hat-trick. No matter that he stumbled as he shaped to shoot, Advocaat’s defence proved powerless to prevent the scorer recovering, extending his right boot and watching the ball hit the back of the net once again.
With Wickham’s late volleyed goal no consolation to anyone connected with Sunderland, Pardew was free to assume centre stage at the final whistle, striding onto the pitch and saluting Palace’s rightly ecstatic travelling support.
Guardian