Exactly. There were no problems with the tactics or the way we set up before the inexplicable red card. We were going to coast to victory and safety, before a shocking decision by one of our young centre halves, which followed a series that could've easily won us a penalty.
My only question for Lampard was why after going a man down Gomes didn't come off. I thought he was a weird selection anyway, but I could see the logic if we were expected to dominate possession.
Once we were down to 10 men, the last guy that should've been on the pitch was Gomes. But I could see Lampard wanting to get to Half, and going up 2-1 wouldn't been a great spot to put on Allan for Gomes for the second half. Maybe he wanted to save a fresh Allan for Palace. Who knows.
I think the element of how many actual fit players we have is misplaced currently given we have played so many games recently. You can see it in Gordon being knackered the effect it has on the players.
I'd like to hope Watford was a direct result of running the players into the ground and them just not having the energy to turn up. So it's a balancing act right now that ultimately none of us could answer. We have players we can't rely on through fitness, entrust a squad player only to see them sent off and the ones out of favour still not earning their place.
I said it earlier but January hit that final nail into the season , 5 players in and only one to show for it. So yesterday , 3 games from the end of the season , if we had 4 additional players in the squad, we would have been able to rest players and keep them fresh. Instead we have ran the same ones out every single week and then just lost some of them to injury.
We end the season with a banner back up striker and a first choice one that really doesn't care about the team.