Santiago Bruno’s 90th minute tap in was Wolves’ only goal against Palace as O’Neil’s side succumbed to Palace’s young squad but there were some positives to take away from the performance.
O’Neil spoke on the game and how he was happy with what he saw despite the loss.
“We conceded two goals from their goalkeeper kicking it over our heads, so there’s a couple of lessons to learn there for the lads. The first one was maybe a bit unfortunate; the bounce of the pitch wasn’t normal and ‘Bents’ maybe just misjudged it slightly. The second one is really poor, booting it over our heads and nobody is ready to race.
“But I thought we looked like a good side for a lot of it. I thought we looked threatening. We had good control against a difficult side, in a difficult shape to play against. The boys who played today were not the ones who started against West Ham, so it was good for them to get some good minutes in the legs. I don’t like losing, but it terms of what we came to get out of the game, it was a good exercise.”
The Wolves manager also mentioned how his side struggled to create a number of chances.
“Rodrigo had two great chances off crosses again. We had a couple of goals that were just offside. Plenty of threat, I thought. Maybe a bit of a sloppy spell after half-time, where we lost our way a little bit, but I’m looking forward to watching it back. It is a difficult shape to play against, but I thought we had a real good go at it, and maybe just killed ourselves – you don’t see many goals scored with punts from the goalkeeper nowadays.”
On the squad’s state, O’Neil said how lucky he was to have such a wide availability.
“We have good numbers available to us at the moment. We made nine changes I think, and the team still looked strong. We’ve still got four or five missing, so to be able to make nine changes and still look like the same team, and still carry the same threat, was good. We’d have struggled to make that many changes last season.
“I’m sure there will be movements in and out, but we’re better equipped depth wise. We have quality missing with Mathues and Pedro – real game changers – but I thought the lads who played gave everything and showed moments of quality, and we should have found a way to make it easier for ourselves.
“The group’s in a good spot fitness wise. Disappointed that we’ve lost Matheus for a little while, but apart from that, everyone’s in a good spot.”