Roy Hodgson will rely on only 13 players to carry Crystal Palace to Premier League safety

Palace have been boosted by the return to fitness of Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who came off the bench in Saturday’s 2-1 defeat by Liverpool

Wilfried Zaha will be crucial to Palace’s run-in (Getty Images)

Roy Hodgson will rely on a core of only 13 players to haul Crystal Palace to Premier League safety as his team approach the final six matches of the season one place above the bottom three.

Palace have been boosted by the return to fitness of Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who came off the bench in Saturday’s 2-1 defeat by Liverpool, but with a threadbare squad and the forward Alexander Sorloth still suffering from a hamstring injury, Hodgson says he will depend upon a small group of players made up of Loftus-Cheek, the soon-to-return James Tomkins, and the weekend’s starters who included Wilfried Zaha.

“We’ve got Loftus-Cheek back in our fold, which is something we really appreciate,” said Hodgson. “Our squad is very very limited, everybody knows that, so we need to keep the 11 players who started the game today, plus Tomkins, plus Loftus-Cheek. These 13 guys really are going to see us over the line.

“Of course with the help of some of the other subs today, all of whom are more than competent, but if we’re talking about making a difference in the game, we don’t have five Loftus-Cheeks and we don’t have five Tomkins on the bench.”

Sorloth’s absence means Christian Benteke will continue to lead the line, despite his haphazard finishing against his former club Liverpool, when he slashed two presentable chances off target within two minutes while the score was level.

“I think he showed a lot of confidence in his all-round performance,” said Hodgson. “We’re talking about two isolated incidents, where you don’t have time to think, the ball comes your way, you strike it and you hope you’re going to strike it below the bar and it’s gone over the bar.

Benteke was not at his best against Liverpool (Reuters)

“I think he’s worked hard with himself, we as a coaching staff and the other players have worked had with him to encourage him to do what we want to see from him on the field of play, both when we have the ball and when we don’t have the ball. And I’ve been very pleased with his performances lately.

“Unfortunately after today people will just focus totally on the fact that two chances came his way that he didn’t take, and it’s going to be a job for us now to make sure that we don’t lose so much of what we’ve got from him in the last two or three games, where his all-round performances have been very good, in my opinion.”