Crystal Palace manager Oliver Glasner attended the pre-match press conference ahead of the game against Sunderland.
On Player Fitness
"Fortunately, all players who featured in international matches have regained full fitness, so every one of them is available to play. The injured players have recovered extremely well.
At the moment, it looks like Adam Wharton, Ismaïla Sarr, and Eddie Nketiah will at least be available for the game against Liverpool—in two weeks' time. Our medical team has done an amazing job.
None of them will be available tomorrow, though. For Millwall, they’re all out; maybe Adam and Eddie stand a chance of playing against West Ham.
We have 18 fit players—and all our new signings will be included in the squad tomorrow. Jeremy [Pino] is very likely to make his first start for Crystal Palace tomorrow."
“He just needed some rest during the international break. He didn’t train in the first week of the break. He sustained a minor knock in his last game against Villarreal. But after that, he returned to training preparations from Monday onwards.”
On His Relationship with Crystal Palace
"If I didn’t want a divorce, I’d have to stop communicating so frequently with Steve—I talk to Steve more than I do my wife. She asks me, ‘Are you married to Steve or to me?’
After the transfer window closed, everyone was glad to stop talking about all that stuff. We’ll talk about my contract later, but over the past two weeks, everyone has been absolutely exhausted, and no one wanted to discuss my future.
We all want the best for Crystal Palace—every player, every staff member, every board member, and our owner. Steve doesn’t want what’s best for himself, and neither does Oliver Glasner. We have no ego. We only think about Crystal Palace.
The club has short-term, medium-term, and long-term goals. What happens in ten years doesn’t matter. After Nuno left, I’ve been in charge for 18 months, making me the 7th or 8th longest-serving manager in the Premier League. So, is there any point in talking about what will happen in ten years? No, there isn’t.
We could have sold Marc earlier—say, in the winter or last summer—but I thought Crystal Palace was still waiting for its first trophy back then. Maybe in the short term, it wasn’t the best choice financially. But for everyone’s experience, it was definitely the right decision."
On Reports of Threatening to Resign Over Guehi
There were reports that Glasner had threatened to leave the club in order to persuade Parish to drop the idea of selling Guehi. However, the manager—who led Crystal Palace to FA Cup glory last season—insisted this was not the case.
"I never threatened to leave the club. Never.
The chairman asked me, ‘Do you think we can get through this season if we sell Marc?’
I said, ‘To be honest, we can’t in the short term. We only have three central defenders, and with our fixture list, the injury risk would be huge if we sold him.’
Then he decided to keep him. The chairman deserves full credit for that. I didn’t threaten anyone. There was no tension between us at all. He decided not to focus on wages or transfer fees, but on Crystal Palace’s on-pitch performance instead.
Marc has handled everything really well. We talked on transfer deadline day and the day after—when he was still with the England team. He’s always 100% focused.
There were earlier reports that he would step down as captain—but that’s not true. As long as he’s here, he’ll remain our captain, because he’s an outstanding player and has a strong character.
Marc signed a contract with Crystal Palace years ago. No one forced him to sign it. It’s clear he’ll honor his contract, and he takes pride in fulfilling it. He has never refused to play, nor threatened to do so—because he’s a very honest person. I never worried about that happening. I got all the information directly from Marc.
We also talked about this before the transfer deadline, and then it actually happened. For Marc, it wasn’t a surprise, because he knew I wanted him to stay. He accepted that. That’s why we—and every Crystal Palace fan—are so happy that Marc will stay and play here for at least three and a half months. After that, we’ll see what happens next.
