It’s good that we are still in the hat. That’s the most important thing, we have got an important hurdle to jump away at Palace and of course there will be disappointment from everybody with regards not getting a big Premier Division. Coventry will be feeling the same but Middlesbrough is a tough game whatever happens. The only thing you want to try and do is get through to the next round and then you have got a chance to fight on, so we are pleased to be there.

It is business as usual, we have got a game to prepare for which is very important, it’s an extremely important three points.

The one message I want to put out is that I feel our fans can play a key part tonight. We would ask them to come out in their numbers and we would ask them to become very vocal because they can be a great help to us, especially in games like this where we need to go and put as much pressure on the opposition as we can. From a playing point of view we will obviously go and work as hard as we can to get the three points.

We will certainly be freshening up, we have got a lot of very good players coming back. Matty Hill is also included, Matty has come through training which is good and he is back in along with the two cup-tied lads, we also  have McKenna and Nugent back who were suspended. It’s looking nice and healthy.

We know that they have got good players and an excellent strikeforce as we saw on Saturday when they had Jon Macken on the bench. That was my on concern when I looked at our bench and I saw young Warren Beattie and Ashley Parillon and young David Hibbert starting his first game, although we are bringing players back it certainly won’t make the game any easier because we are going to have to work very hard to go and win three points. It is nice to have the depth of squad that we have for this game.

They have also got one or two changes that we can make with people like McAnuff, Ward, Macken and Hughes coming on to the park and they have also got a huge depth of squad and they can make many changes. Likewise we are just delighted that we can bring in a couple of fresh faces and some fresh legs.

The plan that we have got is to see how they can handle David Nugent. I think it is all about us, we know that they have got good players, many other clubs have, our target is to get three points to keep the good run going and make it 21 games without defeat. It will be very important if we can do that and push ourselves above Palace, it’s there for both teams with the position that we are in. It is all about getting our best players playing to their full potential and if we can do that then we know that we can cause a lot of problems.

It is just another game, it is preparing for a game of football with the personnel that we have got. Inbetween the two Palace games there is a very important away league match at Stoke that we have got to concentrate on.

At the end of the day, let’s not be kidded, it was a wonderful wonderful free-kick. It has actually worked three times. David Kelly was the first one to score for Motherwell Football club against Aberdeen at Pittodrie when I took him up to Scotland and he scored with the free-kick. Richard Cresswell was the second and now without a doubt the best finish was David Nugent. When it works it is nice but especially in a derby match, we work very hard at set-pieces as everybody knows and we will try and pull out one or two more before the end of the season. The one against Burnley was particularly pleasing because it is the quality of the keep-up from Graham Alexander and then the weight of pass over the wall but it is the sublime finish from David Nugent, to show that technique with the ball coming over the wall is a delight. I’m sure if that was Barcelona they would be showing that on many videos but with little Preston North End it may not be as such.

It was a very good performance, an excellent result. We knew it would be tough and we knew that it would be a difficult match and very competitive which it turned out to be but I thought we thoroughly deserved the three points. It was an excellent team performance as well as many very good individual performances.

That’s what he is capable of, he leads by example and you can see that with his workrate and i thought that he struck up a very good partnership with David Nugent. We now have in my opinion five excellent strikers including young David Hibbert who was unfortunate to be left out tonight. We have now got that group of players to contribute greatly between now and the end of the season, I thought Brett was first class.

Believe it or not he has not even had a training session because of the weather we have had in the last couple of days we have not had to do the training we would like. He came in and we had one or two laughs and he got to meet the boys, he has settled in very quickly with a great bunch of lads and you can see that with the attitude he had tonight. We were playing against a club with huge resources, you look at their bench and the people they are bringing on and for us to compete it is very very proud for us to go out there and compete the way that we did and to get the three points is a tremendous bonus for us. We are one away from avoiding relegation which is good and that was  the important thing.

The second goal was straight from the training ground again, it was a wonderful corner kick with great movement and great runs with people that we have asked to go and do what they have done. It was a great great goal and we are very proud and pleased again and thankfully they listened for a change which was nice.

There may be some loan situations that we will look at, I think we can still do that after the next seven days or so. We would still like to try and introduce one or two if possible, it will be difficult but we certainly try and get some kind of loan in, if we don’t then we are very well equipped as long as we keep everybody free of suspension and free of injury.

This lad has come back from a terrible run of injuries and I have said to the board and the people at the club that the lad just needed time to come in and play and as far as I am concerned if this lad doesn’t go international in the next couple of years then there is something far wrong because again his performance today was first class. I think it was in the 88th minute, he has opened his legs and you can see the pace and the energy and the enthusiasm, he has been excellent.

He can play right-back, centre-back, he can play outside-right, outside-left, centre forward and I think his best position is right-back, but he can play anywhere, he has got great attributes.

I think he is Scottish actually.

Unfortunately we have been denied requests of trying to do something and that is unfortunate. We will have to look at it again and hopefully try and bring one or two more in, we know that there are one or two gaps and we would like to strengthen one or two areas so it’s something we will look at. I think we will have to look at one or two of our own players going out on loan for a bit of experience which we will do for the next seven days.

It’s just a reluctance to go and let good players go and the ones we ask about we just can’t quite get there. We have certainly tried but unfortunately the door keeps getting closed, especially in Scotland.

The first 45 we played some great stuff and should have been more in front unfortunately we hit the post and whatever else we have done. But it was a tremendous first 45, a tremendous performance from the players and an excellent three points.

That was the biggest fear at half-time, we couldn’t take the foot off the pedal but we have certainly done that in the second half I feel. We stopped working as hard as we were doing in the first half, we became a little bit slack and we lost a soft goal. It was disappointing to lose the goal but it is expected over a long 90 minutes that something like that is going to happen. It is great credit to the players again, after the long journey from Plymouth and then coming back and finding it difficult to train in the last couple of days, it has been an excellent performance and somebody was telling me that that is seven defeats in 47 matches so we are on a good run and we have got to keep it going.

We are delighted obviously, we are delighted with the goalscorers, tremendous goals, Adam Nowland, Sedge and Grezza I’m pleased for them. They really worked hard today.

Sadly we are losing young David Jones who is going to Holland, he’s joining NEC Nijmegen. We’d like to thank Manchester United for giving us David, we’d like to thank David for all his tremendous efforts and we’d like to wish him all the very best for the future.

It’s until the end of the season. I got the information a couple of days ago when David informed me that both himself and United think that for his development, a spell in Holland will be good for his education. It’s another blow because we have had a lot of transition this season, but in 2005 to have seven defeats in 47 matches, through the transition that we have had to come through, with the chopping and changing of players, illnesses and injuries, young players coming in, it has been very difficult. Now we have got to start again and we have still got gaps to fill, I’ll sit down with the Chairman and hopefully find out if we can bring in a few bodies which I think we need.

His patter is unfortunately not as good as Eddie Lewis’ but he has certainly got a lovely left-foot, he’s only a young player, a young player that is still developing and you can see that with his strength and other parts of his game. But he’s certainly a talent and we just have to be patient with the likes of David Hibbert, Joe Anyinsah and Lewis Neal and Tyrone Mears coming back into it, Patrick Agyemang and David Nugent, when you look at the side it is a very young side, patience is the key and we will try and develop them as best we can.

His last few games have been first class, I’ve said to him today that he has been unlucky. I don’t think we will see the best of David Nugent until he gets a pre-season, I think the three month illness really set him back a long way. He’s now coming back to his best and getting better but I really don’t think that he will get the benefit until he gets a pre-season under his belt and then kicks on from there. He thoroughly deserved a goal, his workrate is excellent, his play, his quality and roll on the 31st of January.

Without a doubt, we lost Brian O’Neil today, he’s pulled a groin and he’s out for probably two to three weeks. So at this moment in time, it looks as if Dickson Etuhu is going to Norwich on a permanent, so we are very short in that midfield area. There are one or two headaches but we will look at the market over the next month and the intention is to try and hold on to everybody and then bring in three or four new faces.

It depends what’s available, we don’t know what’s available, with regards to cash or loans or whatever it might be. I don’t know we have to sit down with the Chairman and find out what we do have, once we find that out then we can try and take it forward with regards the options that we have and the type of money that we have got.

Nothing’s changed since the start of the season. We are only human, we are going to have days off, one or two off days where we are not quite at it. But we have done nothing different but the response from the players at the end of 2005 was first class