Football
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Crystal Palace boss Alan Pardew hails 'best performance' in Chelsea win

Crystal Palace boss Alan Pardew claims that the 2-1 win over Chelsea was his side's best performance since he joined as manager.

Joel Ward popped up with a late winner, after Bakary Sako's opener had been cancelled out by Falcao, as Palace earned their first win at Stamford Bridge since 1982.

Palace have now won eight of their 10 away matches in the league under Pardew, who has three victories against Mourinho in the last two seasons.

"This is the best performance since I've been Crystal Palace manager -- not because of the victory here but the manner of how we played," he said. "We were very, very good today.

"It was a cracking Premier League game. We were resilient, had a great attitude to the game and we had a belief in us.

"It is important to be on the front foot at places like this, we kept creating chances -- which is difficult here. We tried to hurt Chelsea as much as we could."

Palace had confidence coming to Stamford Bridge, despite it being the home of the champions.

"There was a belief in us today,'' he added. "It's difficult to try to overcome the quality of not just the team, but the manager here. We did it. You can nick a win here, you can park the bus or whatever you want to call it.

"I don't think we did that today. We were on the front foot and tried to hurt Chelsea as often as we could.''

Defender Damien Delaney praised his Palace teammates for their sense of adventure as they went out to win.

"That was full throttle for 90 minutes. It wasn't a sit-in, 11-men beside the ball game. We had a good few chances and could have made it more comfortable," he added.

"We've come here the last two years, sat in and got beat. But we said 'if we're going to get beat, let's have a go'. Once we got them on the back foot we thought we could keep them low after their start to the season."

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