Welcome back to the Party at the Palace. If you haven't caught any of the previous posts, you can start from the beginning here.
Right, let's get to the start of the new episode.
We start our 5th season with Palace off of the back of European glory after winning the Europa Conference League in our debut season in Continental football.
The domestic form was slightly disappointing as we failed to make much impression in the league or the domestic cups.
We will again be fighting on four fronts this season after gaining qualification to the Europa League group stages as winners of the Europa League Conference.
It's going to be another long season with some huge rewards available at the end of it.
Off the Field Updates
A large increase in our core supporter base shows what bringing silverware to the club can achieve. We also received a large increase in social media followers, both will help to increase reputation and revenue.
The board expectations remain reasonable. I actual failed their league expectations last season finishing one place out of the top half. I will need to see an improvement in that this season.
The budgets also feel reasonable, the finances of the club are secure but not enough to give us a huge wat chest. We will need to supply this with sales of players.
That being said, let's check out our transfer activity.
Transfer Window
Lets start with the out goings as we try to raise some funds.
We say goodbye to some familiar faces of the save so far. The biggest departure being Francisco Conceicao who never quite hit the heights that were expected of him.
The others were all squad players who had reached their potential levels and weren't going to be able to force their way into my plans.
I decided to splash so cash on a top class right back after deciding not to make Neco Williams loan move from last season permanent.
Nathan Patterson - Joins for a club record fee of £60 million pounds. He obviously has a wealth of experience already and is a readymade starting right back.
Gautam End - Joins for £3.9 million from Excelsior in the Dutch second division. He will offer strong back up at left wing back for Mitchell with a view to being his long-term replacement.
Huge potential and a bargain at under £4 million.
Fernando Pellejero - Taken a small risk on this lad from Penarol in Uruguay. Has some potential but it is unsure how much and what level he can reach. Naturally a right back he will offer emergency cover for Patterson.
Pre-Season
A busy preseason with some very tough fixtures to really get the squad battle ready for the season ahead. All very positive and has set us up well for the marathon ahead.
August 2026
Well, here we are again. The start of the season brings so much hope for what is ahead. Let's get a good few months under our belt from the off.
We need to shake off these slow starts. Another season with a really really tough few fixtures but these are games we need to get points from if we are to take the next step up the league.
It was the League Phase draw for the Europa League in August too, lets see who we were going to be facing.
Some tough fixtures in here and we will have to be on our best to finish in the top 8 to qualify for the latter stages.
September 2026
September brings around another slow month in the league with some very winnable games. Lest start afresh and after our poor start.
A better month with the highlight being a convincing win against rivals Brighton. Lots of goals from our wide players as Bardghji, Mudryk and Schjelderup were our goal scorers.
We also start our Europa League journey with a home game against Mainz 05. We were strong favourites.
We matched expectations with a solid victory to start our continental campaign.
October 2026
With a more positive month behind us we were feeling confident going into October. 4 games in the league coming up and we have a good chance of getting some real momentum going.
Not bad at all. Strong wins against Brentford ,who are no mugs after qualifying for the Champions League last season and West Ham.
We should be beating newly promoted teams like Norwich but again fell short against one of the so called "big 6" when losing to Spurs.
We also had two away fixtures in the Europa League as we travel to Portugal to face Braga and Denmark to face FC Kopenhagen.
Two decisive victories away from home really puts us in a great position in the league phase.
November 2026
We have really seemed to have found some momentum and are showing signs of putting a really, really good run together, especially in the league.
Its a short month but another really good one. We lost to a 95th minute Salah goal at Anfield but apart from that, good wins against Wolves and especially Arsenal shows the form we are in.
Two home games in the Europa League complete the month and with some rotation in mind there is a chance for the squad players to force their way back into contention for some starting places.
Well it didn't really go to plan. The defeat to FC Groningen is our first ever defeat in European competition. A really poor performance but one that was bound to happen with all of the rotation going on.
We bounced back against Hungarian minnows Mol Fehervar smashing them for 6 to get us back on track.
December 2026
Well, it comes around all too quickly it seems. We head into what possibly could be the most ridiculous schedule of fixtures with 7 games in the League and a tough home tie in the Europa League all in the space of 26 days.
It was a tough start as we fall to three defeats on the spin. The second half of the month the was a little bit kinder with the teams we faced and we managed to turn it around to go on a nice run of 4 wins.
We seem to be sharing the goals out well this season without relying on Leonardo like we did last season. The wide players are really chipping in with goals and assists.
The single Europa League game was against Spanish "Giants" Villarreal. This is easily the toughest test on paper.
Two very evenly matched teams who really struggled to break each other down.
Halfway Tables
Its a fantastic start to the season as we sit in the top 7 and still just about within touching distance of the top.
Europa League Group Phase
We are currently sitting in the top 8 on goal difference with 2 games left to play.
Top 8 gets you straight through to the Round of 16 avoiding having to play in the Knockout Playoff Round.
Thanks for reading as always. We will be back with the second half of the season soon. Hopefully this form continues and we can really push for an exciting end of the season.
Cheers
Panda
