Crystal Palace duo blasted for Stoke performance as Patrick Vieira told transfer market priority

Premier Sport’s Shay Given and Kenny Cunningham were highly critical of the performances of both Will Hughes and Jean-Philippe Mateta in the FA Cup against Stoke City on Tuesday evening.

The two former Ireland internationals were covering Crystal Palace’s fifth-round tie with Stoke at Selhurst Park where the hosts managed to squeeze past the Potters 2-1 courtesy of goals from Cheikhou Kouyate and Jairo Riedewald.

But despite advancing through to the quarter-finals for the second time in four seasons though, Palace didn’t look anywhere near the top level they’ve shown at times under Patrick Vieira in the Premier League this season.

The Frenchman made five changes from his side’s 1-1 draw with Burnley on the weekend but it was the performances of Hughes and Mateta - who have both been regulars in the team of late - that both Given and Cunningham took grievances with.

Mateta signed a bumper four-and-a-half-year contract with the Eagles in January and has been Vieira’s first-choice centre-forward over the last two months with starts in all three FA Cup games and a handful of appearances in the league.

But against the Potters he was ineffective, having only two touches more (35) than goalkeeper Jack Butland (33) and firing four shots out of four off-target.

"I think Patrick and his staff will go into training and think they got away with one because they were very poor,” said Given, who finished his playing career at Stoke in 2017,

“Mateta upfront was winding me up. He wasn’t holding the ball up, he wasn’t getting them up the pitch, he wasn’t linking up play.

“Christian Benteke came on and did more in a couple of minutes than Mateta did in the whole 90.”

Hughes also came under fire for his performance alongside Kouyate