Aston Villa 1-1 Crystal Palace: Jeff Schlupp salvages point for Patrick Vieira’s Eagles

Aston Villa and Crystal Palace both kept their hopes of a top half Premier League finish intact after a pulsating 1-1 draw at Villa Park.

Danny Ings passed up three opportunities for the hosts to take the lead in the first half, but Steven Gerrard’s men finally made the breakthrough when Ollie

Watkins slid in his 10th of the season in front of the Holte End (69).

However, the Eagles netted a deserved leveller to earn a point when Jeff Schlupp arrived at the back post to beat Emi Martinez (81).

Top half rivals cancel one another out
Villa stay 12th as a result, four points behind 10th-placed Brighton with two games to play, while Palace remain a point and a place further ahead.

Other than the aforementioned battle to finish inside the top half, there was little to play for at Villa Park, with the hosts taking the opportunity to mark the 40th anniversary of their 1982 European Cup triumph, with members of the squad in attendance.

That pre-match celebration set the tone, with the crowd in fine voice on a cloudy afternoon in the Midlands. Inside 10 minutes, Ings poked a Douglas Luiz cross just past the post and then fired over after a questionable clearance from Joachim Andersen.

Philippe Coutinho blazed over the bar as the chances began to rack up, but Palace found their way back into the game and went close when Wilfried Zaha’s rasping effort was palmed away by Emiliano Martinez.

By far the best chance of the first half, however, came just after the half-hour mark. John McGinn found Watkins with a smart ball that the forward held up and squared for Ings, who curled a shot the wrong side of the right-hand post.

With just over an hour gone, Tyrick Mitchell tried a shot that was well blocked by Matty Cash, with Conor Gallagher’s deflected shot held by Martinez moments later.

Villa seemed to see that as their cue to finally establish a lead in the game and did so when Watkins got the better of Marc Guehi to slide in a glorious cross from Lucas Digne. Palace boss Patrick Vieira felt the defender had been impeded and was booked for his furious appeals.

The lead did not last, though. With nine minutes of the 90 remaining, Guehi flicked a header over to the far post where Schlupp arrived to poke home the equaliser just three minutes after his introduction.

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