Parish: de Boer’s vision for Crystal Palace secured him the top job

Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish admitted it was Frank de Boer’s preparation and plans for drastic change at Selhurst Park that made him the main contender for the top job from the first minute he met him.

Former Dutch international de Boer has managed European giants Ajax and Internazionale in recent seasons, and Parish could not hide his delight at securing such a high profile manager for the Eagles.

Palace ultimately avoided relegation comfortably last term after appointing Sam Allardyce as manager – who promptly resigned as the season finished.

But with de Boer now in place and the 47-year-old having grand plans for a revolution in south-east London, Parish is adamant he won’t be seeing his side in such dire straits this term.

“Seven years ago when I arrived here you would never have imagined that we would be announcing Frank de Boer as our new manager,” he said.

“Now the hard work starts at the beginning of exciting times for the club, we have left the pressure of last year behind us and we move on all very excited at the prospect of him being here.

“Frank was really engaging and had put a lot of work into getting ready for our meeting to cover his playing and management career.

“We both spoke about a revolution that we need here and how we can change from the pattern of this club over the last two seasons.

“We want to look at a way of getting the best out of our players and also look at how we can get through some players from our academy and get some youth in the team.

“As we know that is something Frank is all about and I must say that was part of a really engaging meeting with him.

“We went into our meeting thinking it would be 50/50 that he was a possibility and came out with Frank very much top of the pile.”