Crystal Palace vs Everton: Roberto Martinez turns attentions to Manchester United semi-final after 'perfect' draw
Martinez believes the timing of Everton's 0-0 draw with Palace despite having 10 mensets them up perfectly for their FA Cup semi-final
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Your support makes all the difference.Roberto Martinez believes that Everton’s 0-0 draw at Crystal Palace was “perfectly timed” as they push for an FA Cup win that would save their season.
Everton reached 40 Premier League points, and certain safety, by drawing at Selhurst Park but their main priority now is the cup semi-final with Manchester United on Saturday week. Martinez won the FA Cup with Wigan Athletic in 2013 and has experience in coaching his teams to peak in April and May.
After a disappointing season Martinez is still confident of a glorious finish, and took Everton’s resilience in grinding out this draw with 10 men as evidence of that.
“I am very pleased to keep a clean sheet and manage the game in that way is perfect timing,” Martinez said. “It is great to see we're learning from hard lessons. The timing of this performance is probably perfect. It all matters for the final weeks of the campaign. We have lost too many leads late on, we have lost too many points late on. It's now you want to hit your top level. You want to shine in the last few weeks of the season, and we showed the solid approach today.”
Martinez was delighted by the fact that his side will face Louis van Gaal’s Manchester United, rather than West Ham United, next Saturday evening. “The semi is a good opportunity for us to show what we can do,” Martinez said. “We hit the crossbar at Old Trafford but we were not at the level that we should be. A semi-final of the FA Cup at Wembley is as good as it gets. We'll enjoy it and be ready.” Martinez admitted a slight concern over Aaron Lennon’s hamstring with 10 days to go until Wembley.
Alan Pardew admitted that his mind is already on Wembley and that he is giving opportunities to players to assess them for Palace’s own semi-final against Watford the following Sunday.
“It's such an important game for this football club, I'd be doing a disservice if I wasn't giving game-time to players to give them a chance,” Pardew said. “Perhaps I should have brought Emmanuel Adebayor on at half-time rather than Connor Wickham, but good for him that he got half a game.”
Pardew said that his two most important players, Wilfried Zaha and Yannick Bolaise, would have to improve ahead of next week.
“At the top of the pitch, we need to find something inspiring,” Pardew said. “Bolasie and Zaha were okay in parts, other parts not so good, and those two players make a massive difference for us. We have to plug them into the electrics for Arsenal, United and Wembley to be a team going forward.”
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