Football
PA Sport 8y

Crystal Palace expecting 'one or two' more signings - Alan Pardew

Alan Pardew expects Crystal Palace to recruit "one or two'' more players before the conclusion of the summer transfer window.

The manager has made little secret of his desire to sign another striker to follow the £27 million arrival of Christian Benteke and remains interested in Chelsea's Loic Remy, who he managed at Newcastle.

He has also already strengthened with a new goalkeeper, defender and winger in Steve Mandanda, James Tomkins and Andros Townsend, twice breaking the club's transfer record for the latter and then Benteke.

The departure of Mile Jedinak for Aston Villa has, however, left Pardew without a ball-winning defensive midfielder, and asked of his plans before Wednesday's deadline, he said: "You can rest assured that one or two are coming in.

"We're not really close on anyone at the moment. We were close; it's gone away a little bit, so that's the world we're in at the moment. Everybody's jostling, but it will all happen.

"Just perhaps a bit of common sense here from agents, chief executives, and then we'll be okay.''

Wilfried Zaha, who as a substitute inspired Palace's recovery from a goal down in Saturday's 1-1 draw with Bournemouth, on Thursday asked to be allowed to join Tottenham.

Palace rejected an offer of £12m for the forward with both Pardew and chairman Steve Parish saying they expected him to stay, and the manager added: "The chairman made [Palace's stance on Zaha] very clear and I hope that's true.''

Pardew was also asked about being booed off by Palace's supporters at half-time while they trailed 1-0, as he also was at the final whistle when they lost by the same scoreline two weeks ago to West Brom.

"Forget what Palace fans think of me,'' he said. "The ones who didn't see me play here are the new fans. I'm Crystal Palace; it's my team, it hurts me that my team would play like that if it was me as manager or somebody else.

"It was a hell of a responsibility on me in the second half to make sure that we never dish that out again but I'm making changes and I have to kind of cut through [that] and feel for the players a little bit.''

The result meant that, like Palace, Bournemouth have started the Premier League season with two defeats and a draw.

They perhaps deserved more than last week's 1-0 loss at West Ham, before which Eddie Howe said they had done "99 percent'' of their transfer business. The manager remains adamant their results are unlikely to change that.

"We've always been very clear of what we wanted,'' he said. "I've said possibly there could be one more, but this is a crazy transfer window so you just never know. I can't give you an indication of anything at this minute; we'll see what happens.

"This is going to be the toughest Premier League ever, with the players coming in, the managers. With us in our second season, that brings its own pitfalls and challenges. It's going to be a tough.''

^ Back to Top ^