Nketiah takes Crystal Palace past Fulham and earns Sage breathing space

If Crystal Palace could play all their matches in this stadium then Pierre Sage surely wouldn’t be under any pressure at all. A fifth victory over Fulham on their own patch in the space of 18 months courtesy of Eddie Nketiah’s goal against the run of play eased some of the growing pressure on the Palace manager as they booked a third consecutive appearance in the quarterfinals of this competition. The good news for Sage is that Arsenal – who beat them on both of those occasions – have already been eliminated, although he knows Saturday’s game against Tottenham will have much more bearing on whether he is still around by the time it resumes in mid-December.