Preview: Crawley Town vs Crystal Palace - prediction, team news, lineups

Crawley Town will finish their pre-season preparations with a friendly against fellow London club Crystal Palace on Friday night.

The League Two campaign gets underway a full two weeks earlier than the Premier League, with the hosts’ first fixture taking place on August 2.

Match preview

It will sadly be a season back in the fourth tier for Crawley this season, after they were relegated from League One back in May, despite winning all of their final three games.

Manager Scott Lindsey was just unable to turn the tide enough to keep them up, but he will remain in the hotseat for next season, as they seek an instant return to the third tier.

It has been a busy preseason so far, as the Red Devils have lost to Hearts but beat non-league outfits Three Bridges, East Grinstead and Dagenham & Redbridge.

That was before their friendly with Portsmouth was postponed at the weekend due to a waterlogged pitch at the Broadfield Stadium, which was played later in the day behind closed doors, and ended in a 1-0 defeat.

Another behind-closed-door friendly followed on Tuesday, as Crawley were beaten 2-1 by Southampton’s Under-21s, so after three successive five-goal salvos prior to these two defeats, the home side will be hoping for a more positive outcome on the eve of the new campaign.

Palace will be huge favourites to win though, as they have done in both of the last two preseasons, when they beat Crawley 4-0 in 2023 and 6-3 in 2024.

This will be just a second friendly for Palace this summer, with the first being a win over Millwall two weeks ago, where Jesurun Rak-Sakyi netted the only goal.

Oliver Glasner’s men face Augsburg next weekend, before making the short trip across London to Wembley for the Community Shield against Liverpool on August 10.

Chelsea await on the first Sunday of the new season, before Palace will have to play a two-legged Conference League playoff, following their unjust demotion from the Europa League earlier this month.

There are huge expectations for the Eagles this season, and they will hope not to suffer from a slow start like last season, and target the top six, while also making a splash on the continent.

Crawley Town Club Friendlies form:

L W W W L L

Crystal Palace Club Friendlies form:

W

Team News

Harvey Davies has come in at Crawley on loan from Liverpool and he is set to be the club’s number one goalkeeper this season, especially if Jojo Wollacott is unable to recover from injury in time for the new campaign.

Joy Mukena joins Wollacott on the sidelines, but Josh Flint, Harry Forster and Louie Watson have all recovered from setbacks during the course of preseason.

Jay Williams has made a return to the club in this transfer window and is set to feature, after leaving along with manager Lindsay to MK Dons last season.

Marc Guehi, Adam Wharton and Nathaniel Clyne are all back from injuries that saw them miss the back end of the previous Premier League season for Crystal Palace.

Talisman and FA Cup final hero Eberechi Eze could make his first appearance of preseason after being allowed an extended break following his involvement with England in June, but Chadi Riad and Cheick Doucoure remain sidelined.

Recent signings Borna Sosa and goalkeeper Walter Benitez both made their debuts against Millwall, and are likely to get more minutes with their new teammates here.

Crawley Town possible starting lineup:

Davies; Radcliffe, Conroy, Barker; Roles, Anderson, Williams, Fraser, Holohan, Watson; Adeyemo

Crystal Palace possible starting lineup:

Henderson; Clyne, Guehi, Lacroix; Munoz, Wharton, Hughes, Sosa; Esse, Mateta, Eze

We say: Crawley Town 0-3 Crystal Palace

Crawley’s results in preseason have been far from convincing, only avoiding defeat against clubs multiple divisions below them, and the only hope they have is a much-changed Palace taking their foot off the pedal.

For data analysis of the most likely results, scorelines and more for this match please click here.

Written by
Andrew Delaney

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