Sarr shoots Crystal Palace to 1-0 win over struggling Ipswich
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Sarr shoots Crystal Palace to 1-0 win over struggling Ipswich
LONDON (Reuters) - A beautiful chipped finish from Ismaila Sarr late in the second half gave Crystal Palace a 1-0 home win over relegation-threatened Ipswich Town on Saturday, with the visitors left to rue a slew of missed chances in a lively Premier League game.
The win moves the Eagles to 11th place on 39 points, while Ipswich remain in the bottom three in 18th spot on 17 points, five behind 17th-placed Wolverhampton Wanderers who face Everton later on Saturday.
Ipswich racked up 15 goal-scoring chances in an entertaining but often sloppy encounter and got eight of them on target, but a combination of wasteful finishing and an inspired Dean Henderson in the Palace goal saw them leave Selhurst Park empty-handed.
Palace were equally guilty of spurning chances, with Eddie Nketia fluffing his lines in the second minute and seeing his shot saved and shortly afterwards his attempted block of a clearance by Ipswich keeper Alex Palmer bounced to safety.
Eberechi Eze took on the creative burden for Palace in the second half as a heavily-deflected effort looped over Palmer and struck the far post, much to the relief of the Ipswich defence.
The visitors looked to attack on the break but all too often their final ball was poor, forcing them into shots from tight angles that were easily dealt with by Henderson. When they failed to score around the hour mark following a goal-mouth scramble at a corner, the writing was on the wall.
That set the scene for Sarr to steal the headlines and, shortly after sending a glancing header from a corner just wide, the Senegalese forward stole in behind the defence in the 82nd minute to score with a lovely dinked effort past Palmer to secure the three points.
"The game today was tough but we won. I am happy for myself and the team but we need to keep going and working hard... the first half was tough but in the second we scored and got the three points," Sarr said.
The 27-year-old forward dedicated his goal to team mate Jean-Philippe Mateta, who suffered a horrific head wound that required 25 stitches in last week's 3-1 FA Cup fifth-round win over Millwall that saw Lions keeper Liam Roberts sent off and banned for six games.
"I did it for him, he is my guy. He is a good guy... he is doing good," Sarr said.
