Eberechi Eze and Jean-Philippe Mateta complemented each other’s efforts after helping Crystal Palace to an impressive 5-0 Premier League season-ending win over Aston Villa on Sunday.
Mateta scored a hat-trick, becoming the first Palace player to do so since Yannick Bolasie in 2015 while Eze scored a brace to hand the South London outfit their sixth win in their final seven league games of the season.
Eze and Mateta assisted one another for the fourth and fifth goal and celebrated their contributions on the pitch.
“He’s what I’m playing for, man,” Eze said of Mateta. “He’s finishing everything that comes to him, which makes our life a lot easier when I’m playing for him, so it’s good.
“I did come close [to a hat-trick], but the most important thing is putting in good performances. We’re all going to flourish, we’re all going to have games where we score. Next time we’re going to score.
“We’re preparing the work and we’re doing the work before we go on to the pitch, so we’re enjoying it, that’s the main thing.”
Dean Henderson with the distribution.
Ebs with the link-up.
JP with the hat-trick.#CPFC | #CRYAVL pic.twitter.com/VOnYmNVaoR— Crystal Palace F.C. (@CPFC) May 19, 2024
Meanwhile, Mateta said of Eze: “I’m very happy because we win a lot of games. We play with this guy [Eze] always, the team is climbing. It’s very fun when you win and you score a lot of goals.
“We worked so hard, and I think we see the reward now, we see the benefit now. We just enjoy it, we have fun on the pitch.
“I can score, I can give the ball.”
Sunday’s victory also saw Palace finish in 10th place, marking a massive turnaround under coach Oliver Glasner who took over from Roy Hodgson in February.
