Roy Hodgson insists Crystal Palace’s strikers do not need telling it is time for them to start scoring.
Palace have struggled in the final third this season, scoring only five goals in nine Premier League fixtures, and all away from home.
On Sunday they host Unai Emery’s in-form Arsenal, who are pursuing a 12th successive victory, and are at the start of a difficult run of fixtures in which Chelsea, Tottenham and Manchester United follow.
The physical presence provided by the injured Christian Benteke has been missed, but in his absence and after his long-term struggle for goals, the fit-again Alexander Sorloth and Connor Wickham and the on-loan Jordan Ayew have the chance to establish themselves in Hodgson’s starting XI.
If Palace remain impotent their manager could yet revert to using Wilfried Zaha and Andros Townsend in an unorthodox front two, but he has felt no need to resort to warning his strikers of their responsibility to the team.
“I’m pretty sure that if you spoke to our strikers as a body and you asked that question, ‘Is it time for you lads to start stepping up and scoring goals?’, of course they’d all say, ‘Yeah, absolutely, 100 per cent’,” Hodgson said.
“We are great believers, all of us, and that goes right the way through the club, and in particular the players, in accountability and responsibility. We don’t try and shirk responsibility; we don’t try and shirk accountability.
“Maybe you’re not being adventurous enough and getting the ball in the opposing team’s area enough times, in which case the strikers will say, ‘The reason I’m not scoring goals is because the ball’s not coming’.
“If of course you are getting the ball there and the chances are being missed, that’s when you expect your strikers to start looking in the mirror and taking some responsibility and say, ‘Well, the chances are coming my way, I’m not putting them in the back of the net’.
“But in football there’s always opponents in there to stop you; we might not have played the top six but we’ve played some pretty good sides.
“We’ve got to keep going and make certain that we take full advantage of any good play that we have, that we eliminate chances at the back, and we take our chances up front.”
