The last time Crystal Palace won three Premier League matches in a row, Jordan Ayew scored in each, Roy Hodgson was masterminding a surge up the table and eyes were fixed eagerly on what might come next.
Fast-forward just over three years and the similarities are striking.
As his number was held aloft on the fourth official’s board a minute from time in Saturday’s 2-0 victory over Southampton, Ayew’s name was belted out by the travelling Palace supporters as he made his way to the touchline. The appreciative din was an acknowledgement of his excellence. He, like so many of his teammates, has been revitalised of late.
His influence on the side’s upturn has been obvious.
The 31-year-old is an unlikely hero, not least because that burst of form back in 2019-20 always felt likely to represent the pinnacle of his Palace career. He scored nine goals to end the team’s top scorer in that COVID-19-interrupted campaign. He won the club’s player of the month in August and October, was crucial in what extended to a four-game winning streak in the three games preceding lockdown and the first match of Project Restart, and was later voted the Player of the Year.
He was instrumental and scored the winner in a 1-0 victory at Brighton, the second of the quartet of victories. His deft clip over Mat Ryan that afternoon had the Palace fans, delirious in the away end, serenading him. Those scenes were a far cry from the most recent visit to the Amex stadium last month. There were boos that night when, with his team’s attacking performance floundering, Patrick Vieira replaced Michael Olise with Ayew midway through the second half.
Under Hodgson, though, the Ghanaian is thriving again.
Against Southampton, there was no goal for Ayew to celebrate, and officially not even an assist to set his performance apart. But numbers alone do not do justice to his actual attacking output.
The previous mitigation for playing Ayew was to focus on the role he plays in freeing up others and his diligent, dutiful defensive work. Now that is an afterthought. His work in possession is what matters; his threat in the final third.
It was Ayew whose clever run and incisive pass set Jean-Philippe Mateta free to fire in a stoppage-time winner in Hodgson’s first game back against Leicester to kickstart this latest renaissance. His brace against Leeds was vital as Palace ran riot after the interval to win 5-1. His tireless work at Southampton helped smooth a win which has virtually banished any lingering relegation fears.
The impact is as timely as it was in 2019-20, when he was summoning winners at Brighton and scoring that goal of the season after dancing through West Ham’s defence and chipping goalkeeper Roberto on Boxing Day.
Ayew actually ballooned his most presentable chance over the bar late on at St Mary’s after striding on to Olise’s perfectly weighted pass. He buried his face in his hands, disbelieving at his miss. But one fluffed line was not going to wreck his afternoon.
In previous matches, that might have garnered a frustrated, even angry response from the stands. Not so this time. His name was merely sung with greater gusto.
For the third game running, Ayew was a menace. Eberechi Eze will amass the plaudits for his two goals, but without Ayew’s willingness to run, his threatening drives at the Southampton defence, Eze’s opener may never have arrived.
Criticism has been levelled fairly at his lack of goals in the intervening period. At his lack of assists or attacking contribution. The metrics make for rather grim reading with 18 goals from 167 Palace appearances. On the international stage, he continues to divide opinion: Ghana supporters, much like many Palace fans, have been left bewildered at his regular inclusion.
Yet there are moments when Ayew summons something to justify his selection in an attacking sense. A perfect cross for Mohammed Kudus in Ghana’s World Cup group match win over South Korea in November earned plaudits, as did his involvement in all three of the team’s goals that day.
But it is at club level where he is thriving again.
At Leeds, he scored twice for the first time ever in a Premier League game, but there, too, he was enthusiastic, dangerous, threatening and at the heart of everything Palace did well going forward — even if that was slightly overshadowed by the performances of Eze and Olise.
“He knows us, we know him, he feels comfortable with what we are asking him to do,” Hodgson said after the Southampton win. “He knows we will back him up and get behind him, and he is repaying us by playing so well.”
In some ways, that success in 2019-20 and the changes in the squad to favour more technically gifted players has heightened the expectation of Ayew. Possibly unfairly. The news at the end of March that he had signed a contract extension was met with derision. The fact he cost only £2.5million (now $3.1m) often goes forgotten.
But, whatever his faults, that figure has been repaid many times over.
Few players polarise opinion as much as Ayew but even his harshest critics must now appreciate he is rejuvenated, renewed and reinvented under Hodgson. He typifies the transformation this side has undergone in the last month.
The spring in his step is a reminder why everything is suddenly so exciting again.
Source: The Athletic