Crystal Palace continue remarkable record on the road, to become London’s sole semi-finalists in this year’s FA Cup
Fulham (0) 0 v Crystal Palace (2) 3
Eze 34
Ismaïla Sarr 38
Nketiah 75
By Kaz Mochlinski at Craven Cottage
FA Cup
Sixth Round
Talking Points
“Wembley again, olé, olé!” sang the Crystal Palace fans as their team impressively reached the FA Cup semi-finals, but the Eagles’ manager, Oliver Glasner, is refusing to get too carried away by the feat.
“I don’t want to talk about winning a trophy, because even in the next game we can’t win a trophy. It’s just the semi-finals” commented the level-headed Austrian after his side successfully overcame Fulham.
“At the end, when you enter a cup competition, especially a cup competition, it doesn’t matter if you lose in round number one or in the semi-finals. You enter the competition to win it.
“So, yes, it’s a great achievement to play the semi-finals, especially here in this environment at Wembley, because it’s also something special that also the two semi-finals are played in the final stadium.
“And this is something typical English, and I really like it. But, at the end, it’s about being ready in four weeks to win this game. And right now it’s not worth for us to prepare for the semi-final in four weeks’ time.
“So now we start tomorrow preparing for Southampton. Because also in the league we have the chance and the opportunity to enter the top half. It’s good to have all the players together now. And we have to keep going.”
It is three years since Crystal Palace last got to the semi-finals of the FA Cup, and nine years from the second of the two final appearances in the club’s history. A first ever trophy triumph is a tantalising possibility.
The Eagles will approach their Wembley date in one month’s time looking to carry on a very promising run of form, with only two defeats in their last 15 matches - and now five wins in a row in all competitions.
They have kept three clean-sheets in those five victories, which began by beating Fulham at Craven Cottage in the middle of February. That 0-2 result was surpassed by this even more significant 0-3.
In actual fact, Palace had won every single one of their games away from Selhurst Park in 2025 by the same 0-2 scoreline, with this latest performance simply maintaining their 100% winning record on their travels this year.
Perhaps the sole surprise was Eddie Nketiah adding a late third goal to cause the first change in the sequence. But they have still been successful in six successive away matches without conceding a goal.
In total, Palace are unbeaten in seven consecutive games on the road, since losing 3-2 in their last quarter-final, in the League Cup, at Arsenal on 18th December. As things stand, Wembley should not worry them too much.
Certainly, Glasner is eagerly anticipating his first personal involvement in a match at the famous stadium, although it may mean some adjustments to his and the players’ familiar gameday routines.
“If we have to arrive in a suit, we will arrive in a suit” he acknowledged with a smile. However, Glasner has already visited Wembley three times, in a non-working capacity, since moving to London just over a year ago.
On each occasion he has travelled by Tube, and he has stopped on coming out of Wembley Park station to admire the arch above the stadium, before revelling in the well-known walk down Wembley Way.
It was one of the earliest outings which he wanted to make after arriving in England, going to watch the national team play Belgium last season, and returning there at the start of this week for the Latvia match.
While Glasner’s latest visit was maybe the most memorable, as he watched Eberechi Eze score a first goal for England, the Palace boss might have gained most information about the great venue at a non-sporting event.
He has happy recollections of dropping his daughter off at Wembley for a Taylor Swift concert last summer, when he got to see the place without watching the performance itself, because, as he joked, “I’m too old for this!”
It was Eze whose customary moments of brilliance effectively decided the FA Cup clash at Craven Cottage. The first goal was super-important in such a contest, and the left-winger got it with a sweet cut inside onto his right foot for a fine low finish.
Four minutes later Eze produced a perfect left-footed cross to the near post for Ismaïla Sarr running in to head home. With Palace’s recent record in away encounters, that was essentially game over before half-time.
The Fulham head coach, Marco Silva, was understandably despondent after a surprisingly comprehensive defeat, but he tried not to forget the positive progress of the last two seasons, including a League Cup semi-final and now a FA Cup quarter-final at the Cottage.
“The season was great before this game. We lost an important one. It’s a big punch in our stomach, definitely. We felt this defeat like that. But we have to react, and not hide ourselves.
“It is a moment for us all together to step in, like we did before, and to move forward and to look forward to the last eight weeks of the season that are going to be really important for us.”
However, in the derby between the last two London clubs left in this season’s FA Cup, it was Crystal Palace who moved on to this time be the solitary semi-final representatives of the capital in the most historic cup competition in the world.
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