You don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to work out why we lost tonight.

I'm Roberto's biggest fan but even the best make mistakes and he made one corker tonight. With only 5 games left in the season and you are in a dogfight for a Champions League spot, quite why you wouldn't put your strongest team out is a complete mystery to me and I dare say thousands of others.

I'm not a fan of the Barcelona wonder kid and I think he was very average against Southampton. I was very surprised at him starting. Even more surprised when Naismith who has been in the best form of his time at the club and scoring goals, was left on the bench.

Barkley as a deep lying midfielder in lieu of one of our seasons best performers, McCarthy??? For me the problem wasn't that the team froze on the night it was more about the wrong 11 starting the game.

A magnificent opportunity to put the pressure back on Arsenal and Roberto wasted it.

How poor was Lukaku?
And not for the first time either! He was some player when he just joined us but since his barren run it becomes clear he doesn't offer enough besides his goals.
He just doesn't look like the striker we need. For a big guy you rareley see him go to war, do you?
His touch is generally not the best - which wasn't so much the case early on in his Everton days, was it?

Naismith in his current form offers a lot more. Not the best touch either, but willing to run into space and he can finish. Proper striker goals as well. At least he seems to be giving all he's got every time.

Deulofeu? Same as all season, no end product. Though someone (Lukaku! FFS!) should be getting in position to walk in his crosses accros goals.

This is not a knee jerk reaction. I felt like this about both of them for a while now. Should we try to buy Lukaku? Yes, for 20m max. He does score goals, and you buy potential. He's still a very young lad after all.
But, I believe had Naismith played the same amount of games as Romelu in the striker position he would have matched the big guy's number of goals.

I believe for next season we will have Traore on another season loan. Would make no sense otherwise to have kept him while injured, knowing he would only be available for a couple of games (if, at all) while the other players would be fit again for the run in.

Kone, Traore and Naismith for that position next season. Plus another we might bring in for less money than Lukaku, maybe. No worries if we can't sign the big Belgian.

Anything can happen, look at both results last night. Arsenal can still drop points. It's not over, let's get as many points as possible and see where we'll end up. 70 points + will still be a great achievement and Europa League at least will mean a very satisfying first year under Martinez.

McGeady looked good last night. Osman showed Barkley what is needed by actually wanting the ball in the second half. Stones is some prospect.

Mind you, we should try to sign Yannick Bolasie. He was terrific!

I hope Martinez looks at the game and adopts the defensive tactics employed by Palace. At times it was a wall of yellow shirts so when we lose possession we get everyone back behind the ball. This wasn’t the case and Palace were afforded a lot of space. I thought their keeper was superb and made some very good stops and got a lucky toe to that Barkley effort that had goal written all over it. We did create some very good chances but poor and wayward finishing cost us. Hopefully we can get up for Utd

I know I'm in the minority here; but when I saw the team news come through before the game, I actually thought that Roberto had it bang on.
The assumption by many was that Palace would sit back; and take the opportunity to counter-attack - which, in the end, is what they did.
However by sitting back and allowing us the possession, we needed a bit more creative flair to try and unlock them - hence why the decision to start with Miralles, Deulofeu, McGeady and Barkley actually made sense. How many of us have wondered why we play two defensive-minded midfielders at home to lower-league opposition?
The benefit of hindsight shows that it didn't work out for us, and I do think we under-estimated just how good Palace could be on the break. If it was Pulis' half-beast half-man squad at Stoke, I do think the result could have been different. This ain't the Mutants, however, and Palace showed they have a lot more skill and flair.
I agree with you Ken with regards to Deulofeu - why no player in blue has latched on that he will always put through the hard low crosses from the byline is beyond me, when we can all see it happening from the stands or the comfort of our living rooms.
Looks like it's all on for this Sunday. Hopefully the lads get this result out of their system. Just remember fellow blues; if our team is something; it's unpredictable - so if the pattern continues; we'll snot "the Chosen One" and his ex-league winners by 3-0.

Like it or not, our season now depends on getting three points on Sunday.

I think Roberto is vain and has been led to believe he has a magic touch. He hasn't, and these daft team selections - like in the FA Cup - expose his weakness. He must realise he just hasn't got the players to play Tinkerman.

But he'll learn - and meanwhile WE'll suffer.

Craig, I agree with you.
I thought it made sense to add some extra creativity.
Both McGeady and Deulofeu did get their crosses in.
We just seemed to play without a striker.

Phil, accusing Roberto of vanity is utterly ridiculous. Naivety, perhaps, but he is a young manager and he will learn.
"led to believe he has a magic touch"? If that was the case Phil, he must be wondering why his magic deserted him long enough to see his team get relegated last year.

Ken, I'm afraid I can't agree with your MOTM being Baines, I thought he had a stinker. At fault for the first goal and he wasted more passes than I've seen him do all season. And if you look back at the third goal, Distin pissing about with the ball and giving away a throw in which started the passage of play which resulted in the goal. If you can't do anything else, just hoof it down field.
My other major moan is this. Why do referees constantly fall for the play acting and gamesmanship which allows teams to slow down a game. Feigning injury and time wasting. I pay good money to see football, not some prick of a goalkeeper dicking about with the ball, meandering from one side of the goal to the other at glacier like speed before he stands waving his fuckin' arms about like a 1955 traffic policeman before wellying the ball downfield. Or lying prostrate like he's been shot by Lee Harvey Oswald's brother in the Main Stand. He was obviously unhurt yet Marriner allows the plank three minutes rest......

I didn't think it would be long before PW slithers out from under his stone to give Martinez some stick. All excited about seeing your lover boy Moyes on Sunday, Phil ? ;-)

Almost as if Palace new our starting line-up and planned for that - just as Pulis is being accused of by Cardiff in their recent game. EPL now investigating. Apparently somebody at palace mistakenly sent a text about it to the Bolton manager, who alerted Cardiff ! Interesting one to watch in terms of outcome.

One of the problems with managing Everton is us the fans - we focus on the wrong things. All the talk for much of the season has been on United and the return of the former boss and if that isn't on the agenda it's the derby games. We as a fan-base should focus on the game at hand. We have this tendency to look at what is coming up rather than on the likes of Palace or the lesser teams. To say I'm upset with both the result and the performance is an understatement; We have once again dropped too many points against the lesser lights of the division and we'll once again pay the price for it.

If McCarthy had a strain then it explains his absence from the starting line-up but surely that is when you put Osman in his place not have three wingers on from the start. Too many of the first-team squad are playing for themselves and that includes Barks who had a shocker albeit in an unfamiliar role in the team. Lukaku blows hot and cold and I still think that Del Boy is vastly over-rated. McGeady has ability but he too lost the ball far too often. Palace looked like the team on the verge of CL and Everton looked like an out of sorts mid-table team. Consistency is the key and until we see this Everton side treat the likes of Palace in the same way as they treat the big boys - we will continue to fall short - which is a real shame because the ability is already there just the mind-set is all wrong at times.

McCarthy was not fit enough for 90 minutes and that is why he did not start.Perhaps Alcaraz would have been a better deputy though.

Anyway, we cannot expect a win every game and Palace were very good and worth the points. Pulis has got a few players worth a lot of money and I have been an admirer of both Bolasie and Puncheon for ages. I said a while ago I would love those two plus Lallana in our squad. Never mind the ready made stars that the so called big clubs go for.

We need Jagielka back in the next game as he would sort the defence out. Stones is very promising but needs a rest as his positional sense is not fine tuned just yet. Perhaps the lad may well develop into a defensive midfielder and replace Barry as he is really good on the ball and distributes well.

We need to get our heads up and hope that Arsenal slip up.

I get the McCarthy thing but I also get Martinez thinking. We've been held up by supposed lesser opposition before playing the two in front of the defence, so I can see why he went for the change. Unfortunately it disrupted us.

CP were able to exploit the obvious gaps when they broke as we had so many players committed. Credit to them also for the defensive organisation and their fans deserve respect too.

We battered them second half, Lukaku was man marked and you could see every blue shirt straining to find space accross their back line. It was admirable the way we tried to keep playing football as the pressure built. Ossie and Nais made a difference. W kept moving the ball trying to pull their players out of position, trying to create gaps. Ultimately the frustration was painful

Phil W Its nonsense to suggest Martinez cant or shouldlt change his format. Hes been using McGeady/Miralles/Barklay/Deulofeu/Naismith in pretty much rotation over the last couple of months and it has obviously worked. He also uses substitutes effectively.

I knew it, I knew it, I knew it and nobody would listen. Playing with gay abandon is easy when expectations are limited. Now a wee bit of pressure is added, we've balls it up. I'm always pessimistic anyway but just as I posted the other day, my worry is our season imploding and Man U and Spurs catching us. Now we HAVE to beat both Manc teams. And yes, Lukaku has been exceedingly average recently and if we can't buy him in the summer, I won't lose any sleep - unlike last night and probably all this week until Sunday.

Agree, Ray, Baines was poor. Mirallas didn't look interested most of the time (Because Delboy steals the limelight??). And Barks running at defences looks exciting but often just slows the game down - as Patrick says, that was probably one for Osman to start - the pace of the game quickened once he was on as he just keeps getting and recycling the ball to keep the pace in the game.

I didn't think McGready played that badly. What I was frustrated about about was that we had a number of good crosses into the box close to the keeper just begging for somebody to anticipate and get in close to the keeper. But it didn't happen until Nais came on, and see what happened.

I'm also frustrated not just at the poor crossing from corners but that when they do hit the spot we can't get a head to them, despite the size of some of our guys. How often do we get a head to a cross, never mind score.

We dominated that match but lost. They had 4 shots on target and scored 3 of them with the Puncheon and Jerome finishes both very high class, especially for quite journeyman players.

We didn't have the balance of usual but we also didn't have the luck. There's still much to play for and if we can stay within touching distance of Arsenal then they may yet slip up. Such a shame that the chasm between Europa and Champions league is so vast as it makes 5th so incredibly less appealing than 4th.

Ray Roche, your worship of Martinez far outstretches mine of his predecessor, I assure you.

But ALL managers cock up and when they do they should expect to get stick from them who pays their wages.

Roberto is not absolved from this and it has not yet been made illegal to criticise his daft decisions on team selection.

I don't think Martinez got it wrong. His team selection was bold and attacking, as it had to be against a Pulis side we all knew would do exactly what they did. Sit deep with 9/10 men behind the ball, defend doggedly, foul and waste time and try and hit us on the counter attack. It was largely effective; we dominated the ball and they only hit the target four times. The averages work out that you need to hit the target three or four times to score once. Their first and third goals were very well executed, perfectly into the bottom corner - but four times out of five they go straight at Howard or wide. Defensively we were poor but not catastrophically so; Palace played excellently on the counter and got those little bouces of the ball you need.

I think we were a little unlucky, but there were certainly a few very poor performances that caused this defeat. Lukaku was absolutely awful. By far his worst performance; I shudder to think how poor his pass completion rate etc were last night. Mirallas and Deulofeu were also poor. Barkley, Barry and Baines were wasteful in possession with far too many misplaced passes. I thought Stones and McGeady actually played quite well. (Stones' distribution was fantastic. He'll be a regular next season, regardless of whether Distin and Jagielka are both fit).

Had Speroni not tipped Osman's blast over and toed Barkley's excellent shot just wide, we'd have won the game. I'm still hopeful. We just have to maintain the pressure on Arsenal. I'd rather be chasing, to be honest; the pressure is all on them and we know they might just crumble. Jelavic can help us out this weekend while we teach Moyes' Man United a footballing lesson and compete the league double.

With hindsight (a wonderful thing) we would have taken a scrappy 0-0 draw, in a game destroyed by a gusty wind, a few months ago. Ironic that we actually saw a better game last night, but nothing to show for it points-wise.

In one of our most important games, Moyes being too clever by half shattered our hopes playing a weakened team. Last night's loss was due in large part to the same kind of smart-arse meddling with team selection.

I was one of thousands who gave it to Moyes in spades and I feel the same way about Martinez. At this crucial moment in our history, it was farcical to use anything less than our best team.

Still in fucking shock to be honest and extremely fearful for Sunday. To make matters worse the title seems to be winging it's way to....... for fuck sake, need I say any more. If there is a footy god, he is definitely a red, who seems to like a good fucking laugh at our expense.

Regardless of any of the European competitions we may compete in, this team is still crying out for a quality midfielder to open up teams who come to get a point and expose you on the break.

One thing that last night's game showed was the under-estimated quality that McCarthy brings when he is in the team, often overlooked by people on here.

I will not critizise Mr Martinez over his team selection as most times he has been correct and I am sure he is his own worst critic. I definitely agree with the comments on our poor use of corners and free kicks as a goalscoring route.

One thing last night showed, was how unpredictable the Premier League can be so with 12 points left to play for... let's get back on track and get behind the team and the manager who I believe this season has taken the team higher than most of our expectations were at the beginning of the season.

Rob 831, Lukaku was awful, yes he is young and learning, so I think he should learn to not think he is better than what he is, with all this talk we have heard of what he wants to do with regards to Champions League teams etc. Maybe RM wants to pipe down too telling him and everyone how good he is, he wants to try doing it for us more often first instead of bursting a gut once every five games.

You just watch Sunday against big Man Utd on Sky, he will put a shift in then, yet last night his body language mirrored Anichebe at times. In the first half, balls where getting thrown into the six-yard box and he was nowhere, then Naismith comes on and bang... goal, this is a fella who knows where to run and he would have been on the end of one of those balls into the six-yard box in the first half if he was playing.

Lukaku £25m, no chance at the moment, he will be great but he needs a bit of a reality check and a kick up the arse if you ask me.

Hands up all those who keep saying we don’t need two centre-mids. Hands up all those who keep saying Martinez has no Plan B.

I’m with Phil and Dick on this one. Martinez has used a formula that has worked so well this season, so why change it? Why do managers keep making this simple game so complicated?

Martinez said we weren’t ourselves. That’s right, we weren’t. Our season has been built on keeping the ball. Last night’s team had too many potentially excting players who give the ball away too cheaply.

That was Roberto’s second selection cock-up this season. Mind you, if we’d scored first, it would have been another story. We have to score first, or learn how to deal with games when we don’t.

Credit where it is due; Pulis mindfucked RM end of story. Bottling, poor selection, I think not. RM has shown that he learns from his mistakes and will no doubt take lessons from this.

Tahir I agree let us see what Sunday produces. I understand now why Roberto was not happy with the utterances from BK about the interview and top 4 it put too much pressure on the players.

Here we go again!

Perhaps for the first time this season, Roberto over-analysed the situation? Anyone who saw the game at Selhurst Park when we had 79% possession but still only drew 0-0 might have made the same team selection to try to increase the creativity of the side but I'm of the opinion that Mirallas, Deulofeu and McGeedy all in the same team is one or possibly two luxury players too many (I'm still of the opinion that Deulofeu will only be an impact player). I think Palace's reputation went before them and Roberto spent too much time analysing their play, rather than concentrating how we perform to our optimum. Give me his mind-set over Dour Davey's any day but a Moyes-like approach might have actually have paid dividends last night.

And on the subject of mind-sets, the crowd's needs to change too. It seems that we only come to life when we have our backs to the walls, are underdogs or perceive some sort of injustice. I thought support from the crowd last night wasn't quite as intense as it should have been. It appears that many seem to believe deep down that fourth is actually an unobtainable goal and / or that somehow we'll cock up again within sight of the finishing line. I wonder if this ingrained negativity pervades the club and affects the players?

McCarthy not starting was an unfortunate omission. Without his all action, box to box energy we couldn't get our more creative players into the game. I understand he's been struggling with a muscle problem but boy oh boy how we missed him.

I guess Roberto thought that by playing with 3 strikers we could penetrate CP quicker and with a minimum of fuss. Our passing game was actually a hindrance to that method as it took far too long to get the ball into striking positions and even then we looked for that extra needless pass.

Pulis knew his team could not match Roberto's in the passing game so he surrendered the midfield, relying instead on a retreating defence and quick counter attacks. Our fancy dans ponced around with their uncontested pointless going nowhere passes and building up a massive rate of possession.

By time we managed to get the ball to the sharp end we found ourselves faced with a wall of desperate defenders. There are times when the joined up stuff pays dividends and makes for excellent viewing. This is often against top attack minded sides. Unfortunately it seems most sides have now sussed our method plus its inherent weakness. That weakness is a slow build up often requiring the whole team to push forward thus leaving us stretched at the back and open to quick counters.
My other groan concerns how useless at corners are our current centre backs plus Jags. Allowing that our corner kick takers are on a par with Arteta at his worst, Distin and Co are to be seen nonchalantly hanging about waiting for it to hit them.