Crystal Palace win Conference League after Mateta pounces against Rayo Vallecano

After being denied their rightful place in this season’s Europa League, Crystal Palace finally have their revenge. In Oliver Glasner’s final match in charge, it was fitting that Jean-Philippe Mateta should score what turned out to be the winning goal after his January move to Milan was scuppered by a failed medical. It has been that kind of season in south London. Having rescued them from the brink of extinction only 16 years ago, how Steve Parish must have relished this occasion.

The Palace chair found himself sitting next to the Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin for the biggest night in their history and he can now start planning for the Europa League campaign that was denied to them as last year’s FA Cup winners were adjudged to have broken European football’s governing body’s rules on multiclub ownership. As for Glasner, it ends any debate over whether he is the greatest manager in Palace’s history. Having been second best in the first half, he must take great credit for the way his side seized the initiative after the break and the Austrian can now ride off into the sunset with a third trophy in the space of just 12 months. Surely a top club will snap him up soon enough.