Today was no exception, the last day of the Championship again gave extraordinary drama. The battle for automatic promotion for Hull City (vs champions Cardiff City) and Watford (vs Leeds Utd), the battle for the remaining play-off places, contested by Palace, Bolton, Forest and Leicester. Finally the fight for survival, involving Sheff Wed, Millwall, Huddersfield, Barnsley, Peterborough Utd and Wolves (who were almost certainly down).
So much changed over the 90 minutes, as I watched the Palace match I got reports of what was going on elsewhere, but Palace's match was enough to contend with. Early parts of the game Palace dominated, only to be hit by a goal against the run of play, but a great goal from Tomlin it was too, our heads dropped a little until the brink of half time when Danny Gabbidon was brought down by the Posh's Zakuani. Glenn Murray stepped up and cooly blasted it down the middle to make it 1-1 going into half time. Second half again Palace had chances, another clearance off the line stopped them scoring again, and again Posh made the most of it by scoring another cracker, coming in from Mendez-Laing beating Julian Speroni on the angle, 2-1 Peterborough.
At that point Posh were safe, and so too were Palace's playoff hopes, but the Eagles sat in the play-offs precariously, with both Bolton drawing with Blackpool and Forest versus Leicester at a stalemate too, one goal for Forest and Bolton respectively would have dumped Palace out of the play-off places. Ian Holloway quickly made some changes, bringing on Jonny Williams, Kevin Phillips and Stephen Dobbie, all within 10 minutes.
And then Selhurst erupted, as a certain veteran striker wheeled away celebrating another career goal, that man was Kevin Phillips, who with limited space controlled the ball and smashed it into the top corner. 2-2, Palace back secure in the play off places, then on hearing Leicester had retaken the lead at Forest made everything nearly safe. Up to this point, the Posh had been safe and further more so hearing Barnsley were drawing at Huddersfield, leaving their fans cheering in the away end of Selhurst, but the Phillips goal rocked them and silence fell from Posh fans, Palace had their tails up and soon made them pay a dear price. In the last minute of normal time Dobbie swung in a freekick and Mile Jedinak rose and redirected the ball to the near post, completely wrong footing the Posh keeper Olejnik. Selhurst Park reverberated with celebrations, play off place assured, on the other hand a sudden sense of dread flooded the Posh fans as they realised they'd been put into the drop zone in the dying seconds. The final whistle went after 5 minutes injury time, and Palace fans duly celebrated the play off place and a mouth watering semi-final versus arch rivals Brighton & Hove Albion. Peterborough players and fans sunk at the news that Huddersfield and Barnsley had finished level, meaning the Posh had been relegated to League One.
It was an incredible last day, I can only deliver a snippet, the automatic position battle went to the wire too, after the Watford game was delayed, due to a bad injury to their keeper. Let's just say it wasn't the Hornets day!! Palace march into the play offs with their first win in nearly 2 months, and they will have to improve if they wish to avenge that sequence which was started with a 3-0 defeat at the Amex, fittingly the Eagles will get another shot to perform better at the Amex this season, this time the stakes will be far higher though.
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