The feelgood story of Tuesday night was the return of Pape Souare but arguably the biggest plus for Crystal Palace’s prospects was having Mamadou Sakho back in the team.
Although it is difficult to read too much into a match in which both teams made nine changes, Palace kept their first clean sheet of the season and that was thanks, in a large part, to Sakho.
The centre-half, playing for the first time since his deadline-day £26million move from Liverpool, put in a commanding performance in this third‑round Carabao Cup tie.
Sakho had a key role in Palace staying up under Sam Allardyce last season and it was clear last night how badly he has been missed this term with the club rooted to the bottom of the Premier League with no points and no goals from five games.
His assured presence at the back had a calming influence on his team and over an hour of football will help build up his match fitness.
Roy Hodgson took him off with 20 minutes left as a precaution but thinks the 27-year-old is fit enough to start at Manchester City on Saturday — the start of a daunting run of fixtures that follows with matches against Manchester United and Chelsea.
“He was excellent,” said Palace boss Hodgson. “Really good considering it was his first game of the season. We were worried about his level of fitness to play 90 minutes against a Premier League team. We were surprised he lasted as long as he did and he probably could have lasted longer.
“It was not Mamadou who was desperate to come off and he was not cramping up or slowing down. We did not want to take a further chance.
“Will he be ready for Saturday? I think he will, yes. He will certainly be in contention because he is a quality centre-back, there is no doubt about that.”
For Souare, this was his first match since the car crash that could have ended his career a year ago.
In Pictures | EFL Cup Third Round
He started on the bench but was introduced at half-time and produced an encouraging performance, making two good interceptions as Palace held on to the goal they scored through Bakary Sako.
But Hodgson has admitted the left-back still has “a long way to go” before he is back to the player he was before the accident in which he broke a thigh bone and his jaw. Hodgson said: “If he is really going to be the Pape Souare we know and love there is a lot more fitness work and matches required.
“Pape knows there is a long way to go. But he could be an enormously important person for us. It was a risk playing him tonight against a very physically powerful team. I threw him in at the deep end and he came out swimming.”
Palace’s dreadful start to the season cost Frank de Boer his job after just 77 days in charge. Hodgson admitted afterwards that “you do not repair the kind of damage we have suffered overnight” but any kind of positives will do right now and last night was a start.
The boss delivered some more good news when he set a potential return date for Wilfried Zaha. Palace hope the winger will be back from his knee injury to face Chelsea on October 14.
But, for now, Hodgson is looking to build on Tuesday night’s performance. He said: “It is going to be a long and hard process but I know there is light at the end of the tunnel and I started to see some shards of that.
“The week’s work has really pleased me. I’m pleased with the win, pleased with the first-half performance after only a week’s work.
“The second half I was pleased when the going got tougher; we had to dig in, fight, chase and we did that too. It was a very positive evening. We left a lot of players out who have been playing.
“We still have a lot of work to do tactically with the players until we are satisfied that we can produce the level of the first half performance for longer period. However, after one week it would be very churlish of me not to praise the players.”