Crystal Palace 0-0 West Ham: Premier League Match Report
Our record: Crystal Palace · West Ham
Final Score
Crystal Palace
0 — 0
West Ham
Key Moments
Half-time: Crystal Palace 0-0 West Ham
Final score: Crystal Palace 0-0 West Ham
Post-Match Analysis
Match Summary
Crystal Palace 0-0 West Ham was goalless at half-time and goalless at the end. No score in either period, no movement in the ordering, and a London derby that gave one side a point it needed rather more than the other.
West Ham were the side that needed it. They arrived 17th on 32 points from 32 matches with a goal difference of -17, one point above Tottenham in 18th and six rounds from the end. Their recent record was as erratic as that position implies — 2-5 at Liverpool, 1-0 at Fulham, 1-1 at home to Manchester City, 0-2 at Aston Villa, 4-0 against Wolverhampton. A team capable of winning by four and losing by three in the same month is not a team whose survival can be assumed.
Palace were 13th on 42 from 31, difference -1, with a game in hand and nothing to fear. They had won three of five, including 3-1 at Tottenham and 2-1 over Newcastle, and had drawn 0-0 with Leeds — the second goalless afternoon in their last handful. They had taken the reverse fixture 2-1 at the London Stadium in September.
What It Settled
West Ham went to 33 points with the goal difference untouched at -17. It kept them out of the bottom three by a single point and it was, in the circumstances, a decent return from a trip to a side eleven points above them. But a point is not a win, and with five matches left a team in that position needs results that move them rather than results that hold them.
Palace reached 43 with -1 and a game still in hand, safely detached from any danger and equally detached from anything above. Ten points divided them before kick-off and ten afterwards. Nothing about the afternoon will feature in either season's summary, which is precisely why West Ham will have taken it and Palace will not have minded.
Prediction Review
Our pre-match call was Over 2.5 Goals at 1.75. It lost, and it never came close. The case was West Ham's involvement in high-scoring matches — 2-5, 4-0, 1-1 within five games — and Palace's willingness to attack at home. What that reading skipped was the situation: a relegation-threatened side away from home in a derby will usually play for the point first, and Palace had just drawn 0-0 with Leeds in similar conditions. Totals bets need at least one team committed to the game being open. Neither was. Verdict: lost