Crystal Palace’s Schlupp reveals Vieira talk before cameo goal in Aston Villa draw

Crystal Palace player Jeffrey Schlupp has explained what manager Patrick Vieira asked him to do before he came on as a substitute and scored to help the visiting side snatch a 1-1 Premier League draw against Aston Villa on Sunday.

After Villa had taken a deserved lead courtesy of Ollie Watkins at Villa Park, it was the 29-year-old Ghana international who came off the bench and poked home a cross from Marc Guehi and help prevent the Eagles from suffering their 12th defeat of the season on the road.

“I think he’ll be happy with that,” Schlupp said in his post-match interview as quoted by Palace’s official website. “[The instructions were] just to come on, to try and impact the game and I managed to do that straight away.

“It was a bit of instinct. I thought: ‘If I gamble on a second ball it might fall to me’. I think there were maybe two phases in between. I thought: ‘If someone gets a flick on here then maybe I can get in at the back post and I managed to do that.”

Apart from scoring, Schlupp turned into the hero as he raced on to the other end of the pitch to save a goal-bound effort from Villa, putting his body on the line and blocking the effort.

Schlupp has now explained how he managed to make the timely block by saying: “That’s both sides of the game there. They started pushing towards the end, and they had the crowd behind them and started to attack.

“It was a bit of instinct again: I tried to read the game and a ricochet fell at the edge of the box. I got my body in the way and managed to block it.

“They’re a good side. We are right next to each other in the table and I think it showed. Everyone thought it might end in a draw. It was two equal sides going for it today [Sunday] and I think it’s a fair result.”

Schlupp, who last hit the back of the net in the 1-1 draw against Burnley on February 26, has now scored four top-flight goals from 30 appearances this season.

Palace, who are placed 11th on the 20-team table with 45 points from 36 matches, will next travel to face Everton at Goodison Park on Thursday.