According to Sports Illustrated, Luka Milivojevic didn’t sleep for two nights after his injury-time penalty miss against Manchester City.
If Milivojevic’s penalty had been converted, then Crystal Palace would’ve been the first team this season to beat the league leaders and end their unbeaten run. However, the Serbian international put that miss behind him and played a huge part in securing a 2-1 away win for Crystal Palace against Southampton on Tuesday night.
Milivojevic covered a lot of distance covering 11.9km just two days after covering 12.24km against Man City. He had more touches than any other Palace player and he also scored the winner as Andros Townsend fizzed a pass to the Serbian who curled his effort first-time past the helpless Alex McCarthy outside of the area.
This win sees the Eagles in 14th place just three points away from the top ten, while Southampton fall further into trouble dropping down to 17th. Palace are now looking up rather than down and they are one of the in-form sides in the Premier league unbeaten in their last five away games.
After the game, Milivojevic opened up about his sorrow after his penalty miss against Man City but spoke about his joy as he helped his side climb away from the relegation zone. Milivojevic told the Crystal Palace club website: ”I have to be honest I haven’t slept the last couple of nights as it was very difficult for me to take after missing the penalty against Manchester City in the last minute. But thanks to god our team win tonight, I score, and we get the points.”
Palace went 1-0 down thanks to an early Shane Long goal, but they showed character and resilience in the second-half to fight back and earn a vital away win. James McArthur equalised when Townsend’s cross found Christian Benteke at the back-post who headed it across the box to find an unmarked McArthur who volleyed the ball into the roof of the net, and the comeback was complete with Milivojevic’s late strike from distance.
Milivojevic also commented on his side’s relentless mentality adding: ”Not for the first time this season we showed great character and played until the end, never giving up so we are happy and satisfied with this result and now have some rest time ahead of us.
”It has been a quick turnaround with only one day in between the games so it was very hard to recover after the City game but now we have some time before our next match.”
