Jean-Philippe Mateta discusses working with Odsonne Edouard, his own No 9 role and a summer of speculation; watch Crystal Palace vs Nottingham Forest live on Sky Sports on Saturday Night Football, kick-off 5.30pm
Saturday 7 October 2023 18:06, UK
If there is any Premier League player who knows about waiting and biding his time, it's Crystal Palace's Jean-Philippe Mateta.
The Eagles striker started his first match in eight months in last weekend's 1-0 win at Manchester United. Since the start of last season, he has started just seven times in the Premier League.
Such a lack of playing time could have resulted in him finding pastures new. But Mateta tells Sky Sports: "I'm a competitor. There were clubs who asked after me in the summer but I stayed. I'm here for a reason.
"I've had to be patient. It's always frustrating not playing and being on the bench, but I'm someone who works hard and it pays off when I get my chance.
"I have always been like that, I've always had a good mental side to my game, right up until today."
The week the transfer window closed showed why Mateta is valued at Selhurst Park, with a hat-trick against Plymouth in the Carabao Cup third round, then two assists off the bench to earn Palace a 3-2 win over Wolves on Super Sunday.
"That's why we kept him," manager Roy Hodgson said after the win over Wolves "He, because he's not been getting as regular a game as he'd have liked, would have been very keen to go and try his luck elsewhere, but I and the club wanted to keep him."
A closer look at Mateta's game shows he is right in line with the Palace way, especially as a forward player.
His selfless display against Manchester United saw him create two key chances on goal - while no player on the pitch held the ball up more times than the 26-year-old forward.
But that's part of the plan. As a team, Palace hold the ball up more often than any other team. Mateta, Odsonne Edouard and Jordan Ayew are all ranked fifth or higher in the individual standings for this statistic.
So is Mateta biding his time? It applies to when you play as well.
"You need to run - but also hold the ball up because we have quality midfielders behind us and we need to bring the team up and then combine with them," adds Mateta.
"It's about creating space, keeping the ball for the likes of (Eberechi) Eze and (Michael) Olise, the technical players."
But the problem is those two players are out injured. Olise has been missing all season while Eze has just been ruled out with a hamstring injury.
The good news, though, is Edouard could be back after the Frenchman was pictured in training this week - and Mateta enjoys a special relationship with his compatriot.
"He's a great, guy, a really great guy," Mateta says, smiling. "He's someone I chat to a lot in the changing room, we're both from the same area of Paris and have a lot of friends in common."
So could Hodgson deal with the Eze blow by putting Edouard and Mateta - who grew up 20 minutes away from each other in the north-east Parisian suburbs - together as a front two when Palace host Nottingham Forest on Saturday Night Football?
"It could be," Mateta claims. "When I'm on the pitch with him [Edouard], it feels great.
"It doesn't matter if I score and he assists, or he scores and I assist, everyone wins and that's for the best.
And if Mateta doesn't get his chance, he won't complain. This is the player who, in Patrick Vieira's first season in charge at Palace, played just an hour of league football between August and Boxing Day and then recovered to become a regular starter for the Eagles come the end of the campaign.
Last season, his 95th-minute winner against Leicester sparked the Hodgson revival at Palace. Perhaps if he finds the net against Forest on Saturday, a scoring streak could be reignited after so long on the bench…
Watch Crystal Palace vs Nottingham Forest live on Sky Sports' Saturday Night Football this weekend from 5pm, kick-off 5.30pm
