Ward demands Palace ‘come off the ropes swinging’

Crystal Palace must come out fighting when they face Stoke City and Middlesbrough in the coming weeks according to defender Joel Ward.

Sam Allardyce’s men fell to an embarrassing 4-0 defeat at home to fellow strugglers Sunderland on Saturday with Jermain Defoe scoring twice in first-half injury time.

Lamine Kone and Didier Ndong had already put the Black Cats 2-0 up and David Moyes’ side are now level on points with the Eagles at the foot of the Premier League.

Palace face mid-table Stoke next weekend before waiting two weeks to take on a Middlesbrough side who have also had their issues over the last few weeks.

(Photo by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images)

And Ward has called on his teammates to provide a serious reaction when they next take to the field after the humiliation at Selhurst Park.

“We have to get together, dust ourselves off, roll up our sleeves and go, if we don’t do that we’re going to be in very big trouble,” he said.

“We need to come off the ropes swinging – and that’s just the start of it.

“If you get the first goal it’s a massive boost for the side, but we didn’t get it.

“Then we made it too easy for them to get their noses in front and gifted them too many goals.”